When teeth and bones disagree: body mass estimation of a giant extinct rodent

摘要

Body size is correlated with virtually every morphological, physiological, and life-history trait in mammal species As a conseqUenCe. estimates of body size of fossil species are often used for palcoecological reconstructions Characters used as proxies for body mass in extinct species include teeth, skull, and skeletal measurements. We show that the body-mass estimates of extinct species from living taxa can be misleading and depend largely oil the morphological variable selected its a proxy for body mass We also discuss statistical tools that are available to assess the accuracy of body-mass estimates in extinct species Here, We focus Oil the revision of the mass estimate of the giant Miocene fossil rodent Phoberomys pattersom (Venezuela), the 2nd largest rodent ever reported, with ail estimated body mass between 436 and 741 kg. This is far beyond the range of average body masses in living rodents. which vary from several grams to 40 kg. We Conclude that body mass of Phoberonmys was most likely overestimated The species P pattersoni likely weighed between 220 kg and 280 kg. the mass of a horse or I large antelope. DOI: 10.1644/08-MAMM-A-347R1.1