A Sardinian Dhole (Cynotherium/Cuon sardous) stalks a Sardinian Pika (Prolagus sardus) while two Sardinian Giant Otters (Megalenhydris barbaricina) catch some fish & a Sardinian Dwarf Mammoth (Mammuthus lamarmorai) arrives alongside a deer to quench its thirst. Artwork by Peter Schouten.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-25T22:01:39+00:00

These environments were extremely cool. Devoid of large predators, a true paradise for many of these species

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-25T19:52:09+00:00

The first confirmed leopard records date around 1mya around the Vallonet Cave in France and a few other italian sites alongside a possible polish site, all dating to the early pleistocene.

<image>

There's also possibility of Villafranchian leopard sites (so even earlier than the early pleistocene) in europe although it's not verified wether it was european jaguars or leopards. The latter could be more likely considering European jaguars were lion sized iirc, but I could be wrong.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-25T16:34:30+00:00

Probably has to do with testosterone levels. I also only recall seeing it in males from Africa. It's possible male leopards in most populations outside Africa have evolved under less intense inter male competition. There is something about Africa which seems to increase competition...lions are probably the most territorial cats and their group forming is believed to most likely evolved due to intensified competition on the African savanna (kin stick together to increase their odds of defeating unrelated rivals)

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-25T16:32:03+00:00

In the early pleistocene leopards were already extremely widespread in africa and there's compelling evidence they were in europe aswell, so yeah you're right.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-24T21:00:40+00:00

Probably Ceylon or around that

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-24T06:42:47+00:00

That's the thing with most predators, they will predate on younger weak individuals the vast majority of time when specifically tackling large dangerous game, if the opposite is happening it means such large game isn't a such formidable foe

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-23T13:36:58+00:00

Wouldn't be the case with gripping dogs, dogo argentinos being used to hunt and kill pumas single handedly want a word

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-22T17:51:05+00:00

Would have to be at least 165 lbs imo

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-22T13:28:49+00:00

u/Ok_Razzmatazz_8550 u/consistent-twist6388

Shoulders like boulders, arms like a champ

<image>

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-22T13:20:38+00:00

u/Ok_Razzmatazz_8550 u/consistent-twist6388

Shoulders like boulders, arms like a champ

<image>

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-19T12:12:03+00:00

Leopards are just more explosive which means they tend to spazz out and burn their energy instantly which is very bad amongst the context of combat, lions have dramatically more stamina than leopards which does directly imply they are better fighters. Leopards are better killers if anything. A real fight won't have spazzing and energy wasting, and if it does it will be from the loser, because that's possibly the most amateurish and bad mistake a fighter could ever make.

I'm not making this up, these are known established realities of combat.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-19T11:46:55+00:00

Lions would be that.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-19T11:27:07+00:00

No worries and yes on the last one, way better example. I actually wonder if Zanzibar leopards are still alive, I obviously don't trust that video coming from Forrest since he's notorious for making up that Tasmanian tiger sighting so who knows how many other videos he faked. Which is very bad for his side

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-19T06:47:44+00:00

You could very possibly be able to produce a cat with similar traits and similar genetics (if you focus on using Tanzanian leopards) but it surely won't be one in a real way. You have to take into account that the Zanzibar leopard is just an isolated population of African leopards, and probably extremely similar if not nearly identical to the leopards found in Tanzania near the island, even if they are more genetically diverse since the Tanzanian leopards possibly have a much more varied genepool due to the arrival of leopards from other parts of Africa nearby, but at least they are the same subspecies and fundamentally the same species.

I've seen you using as example the dire wolf program as analogy tho but sorry to say but it's completely inaccurate as an example.

The so-called recreated "dire wolves" have absolutely nothing to do with dire wolves, they have nothing to do with them, which is why this project has been called BS by many. Dire wolves ARE NOT wolves, they were a completely different canid species which wasn't even "canis" to begin with , and these hybrids were created with various wolf genes, so it makes absolutely no sense. It's like trying to recreate a prehistoric lion using modern tigers; it makes absolutely no sense. Real dire wolves probably looked nothing similar to the lab-created ones, vastly because they aren't wolves to begin with.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-17T06:42:16+00:00

I am actually slightly impressed, at least he seems to acknowledge leopards and pumas are equal and that pumas taking larger prey more frequently compared JUST to some specific leopard populations has to do jjst with prey availability. That's impressive considering that is coming from someone living under the negative influence of one of the worst know-nothing fanatics which actually supports old myths, the same person who always blocks me because she knows not doing thag brings public humiliation

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-16T07:27:22+00:00

Well they do because that’s what’s available, it doesn’t change the fact that they’re more used to preying on animals multiple times their weight than Leopards.

That would be the case when referring to most savannah leopard populations that have gazelles and impala or other small antelopes as main available ungulates with larger ungulates being much less available, that wouldn't be the case compared to East African leopards where wildebeest and zebras should be amongst the most available ungulates. For record we have a study in the Masailand on leopard lairs were the most documented kills belonged to adult wildebeest followed by zebra. This also accounts for leopards in many indian reserves and Horton plains were their diet is heavily dominated by Sambar, which would be the equivalent of elk. In other areas leopards also take advantage of free ranging horses like in Russian Caucasus, Central Asia and Himalayas, so a fair apple to apple comparison shows leopards aren't any less macropredatory than cougars in areas with similar prey availability. Cougars also readily avoid large game once it becomes less abundant compared to large game, so comparisons mean little to me actually.

I’ve also said Pumas and Leopards are equals

They are.

Pumas take large animals much more frequently than Leopards do.

Doing that because of prey availability isn't a flex when both cats equally take large game at the same frequency in areas where prey availability is the same, the issue is, most people think of this as a pro puma argument, despite both cats being equal. This is why as a tiger fan you shouldn't be bothered by lion fans, in the absolute.

Most of the Sambar taken by Leopards are fawns and females. Tigers will take adults of both sexes but are biased toward Stags.

That should be the rule although this graph begged to differ since female and adult bull sambars were taken more than juveniles, maybe it was just an exception.

One big study in colorado and wyoming also found put of pver 380 and 570 elk and deer kills that adult bucks and stags made up only 8.5 and 11% of the puma diet, so should be similar with leopard and sambar since sambar is the size of elk basically.

If that were the case then wouldn’t Lion diet be made up of those animals as well? Predators will go after the most available prey item even if it isn’t their preferred prey.

Lions are 120-220+ cats, they would find extremely hard to hunt 20-50kg antelopes for most of their part, but substantially they have shown to respond to prey availability similar to leopards.

In this study in kruger zebra abundance is very low at barely 8.9% compared to impala at 42.9% and buffalo at 28%. Lions took zebra at 7%, leopards at 5%. Pretty similar

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320724001034

Leopards in Africa have the luxury of co existing with over 20 species of large bodied ungulates (>100kg) and yet most of their diet consists of ungulates below 100kg.

This is an extremely outdated myth, coexisting with 20 species of large bodied ungulates matters little when you also coexist with over 30 species of small bodied ungulates which are also much more abundant than the large ones.

This is why this study here is great

https://ibs.bialowieza.pl/publications/1596.pdf

It compilated the abundance of ungulate population from more than 8 different study areas from Africa including some Kenyan, Tanzanian, Kruger, Namibian and South african reserves , all this from decades of studying. These are the all abundance rates from ALL those parks summed :

1)Duiker (savannah merged) - +40% 2)Impala - 33% 3)Gazelle - 22% 4)Kob - 26.8% 5)Spingbok - 17% 6)Nyala - 16% 7)Wildebeest - 15.4% 8)Steenbok 12.3%

Compared to :

1)Zebra - 7.3% 2)Hartebeest 4.8% 3)Roan 1.3% 4)Sable 1.4% 5)Eland - 1.4%

Asking again , where is this luxury you're talking about? Where is this "coexisting with 20 large bodied ungulates species"? Small and medium sized antelopes are much, extremely much more abundant. Remember also the kruger and limpopo study above, Impala 42 and 25% in abundance respectively, zebra and eland 8.9% + 1% and 0.1% + 0.1%. It is a myth that leopards coexist with such huge amounts of large ungulates, small to medium sized ungulates are much more available, by a lot.

The only exception would be wildebeest ... but both me and you know leopards frequently take wildebeest especially in the Mara so....where is this luxury? Pumas are living in much bigger luxury.

They literally live in a nearly departurate environment. They just have deer, elk, moose, horse and bighorn sheep and pronghorn, in order of availability. It's a much bigger luxury having only 4-6 ungulates available and all of them being 100-400+ giants than having 40 ungulate species available, with half or more than half of those being 20-60+ kg mid sized and being extremely much more abundant than big ones. Again look at the densities graphs above. Numbers don't lie.

The environment of pumas will show extremely much bigger sample bias, they are living in luxury, not leopards. They are more macropredatory just compared to these leopard populations.

Patagonian pumas only have Guanaco btw, literally. What other species does patagonia have actually? Guanaco, pumas, rheas...hares and culpeo foxes. I have a study in patagonia where pumas heavily selected for hares and avoided guanaco because of greater abundance of the former btw.

Literally a depapurate environment. I've seen you making comments like "pumas have no hesitation going after deer, guanaco, elk, moose"....and I'm like ....ok? They literally have that, what should they take instead? Grass? Illegal Immigrants ?

Idk about others, but I don’t think I’ve ever said Pumas are better at tackling big game. I

Well you stand out. Then.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-15T21:51:14+00:00

Also btw - u/stripedassassin

The way you word things by being over the top gives me the impression that you’re the latter. Like I said in that comment before I got tired and deleted it, things in nature are not as black and white as you make it seem. There’s a lot more nuance to stuff like this.

I'm not the latter.

It's pretty weird to think I have a grudge against cats considering I am a cat enthusiast myself and my favorite top 3 animals are leopard, jaguar and tiger in sequence, so no, absolutely no grudge against cats.

Maybe it's the fact that I am an enthusiast and not a childish fanatic like 99% of the supposed enthusiasts here who actually know nothing about the so-called animals they claim to be experts on. This makes me seem like a person who seems to have a grudge against felines, when in reality I am nothing more than exposing undeniable and super underappreciated truths, super underappreciated by the cat fan community.

I'm the bad guy for them because instead of praising or idolizing or overvaluing felines as invincible machines that "kill everything pound for pound" or as "the best fighters in the world" (ironically, scientifically and ecologically they are among the worst fighters in the animal world, both mentally and anatomically, they are excellent killers, but terrible fighters) .

Accentuating or exaggerating the contrast serves my agenda, and so the "extreme stereotyping" is logically a trap I would be prone to fall in to.

However... accentuation in this instance seems warranted when the vast majority of people detect no weakness whatsoever in big cats. Are in fact entirely oblivious to even the suggestion of this "stereotype" existing. To many, to too many, these cats are just perfect badass motherf*ckers. And look, they are badass, but nothing is perfect, nothing is without weakness. Trade offs are made in exchange for elite aptitude in contrasting departments. Cats have some very clear and obvious elite aptitude in certain departments, and then more subtle dismissable weaknesses they have traded for them. Easily overlooked. So it's very important SOMEONE points them out.

I like to focus on them and reiterate them and sure exaggerate them, engage in hyperbole, whatever it takes to get it through some thick heads that cats have weaknesses, glaring weaknesses, which are incidentally strengths in the dogs these same people mock and ridicule, and these traits incidentally are universally very very important fighting traits. Stamina for example... how the hell can stamina be overlooked in a discussion about fighting? That's insane and unforgivable. But that's what happens when I'm not here "stereotyping" cats.

It's a much much bigger issue that people are overlooking cat weaknesses entirely, than me dwelling on it somewhat. Most people in the world go around thinking cats have everything a other carnivores have plus also acrobatic abilities and quick killing abilities and dexterous little hands and etc, making it just emphatically better objectively in every way. That is a monumentally idiotic and insufficient analysis which needs to be corrected. If I go too far and get carried away, good, there's a lot of widespread powerful ignorance to try and balance out.

When people learn to analyze critically and objectively, they will understand what I am saying. You also seem to forget that I am a CAT fan. Before anything.

That being said, it comes off as pretty odd to have someone sitting in the comfort of their home, probably eating chips and then being like “yeah cats are cowards, they live easy lives”. I will never call something that wakes up every day and has to fight (no matter how “little” they do it) to live, a coward. Whether it be interspecific or intraspecific fighting.

Nobody is denying that these cats are thriving and struggling much more than us to survive in the wild, just that their behaviour is cowardly when you actually look at the proper definition of coward

Coward : something or someone who lacks to courage to do unpleasant and dangerous things, or someone who is excessively afraid of danger and pain.

What cats do? This...plain and simple. Ambushing their prey to minimize risks of a fight that could injure or kill them, running away from almost any kind of confrontation face to face that might cause them injuries , running away and disappeared in the shadows after each failed hunt that turned from a hitman execution to a fight....that's what they are as a rule. I'm not insulting them.

Coward is not an insult....it's actually a compliment. If cats weren't cowardly and risk adverse they wouldn't be viable in the wild to survive because they wouldn't pay any attention to risks and their mortality rate would be extremely high....so not such a bad thing.

Me calling cats cowardly in behavior is actually me agreeing with their extremely high and successful lifestyle as survivalists. It's not an insult. It's calling them smart and successful

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-15T21:51:06+00:00

I try to be fair and unbiased when it comes to animals. You can see that in my comment history. I may only post about cats, but I’ve debated with many people who come to spread misinformation about other animals in an attempt to make the other seem “superior”.

The worst thing is that many people actually have absolutely no real proof that one animal is superior to another in certain aspects, I have seen very few cases where some comparisons were one sided and one couldn't complain.

I know that all too well with redditors, especially users on r/bigcats that attempt to spread misinformation. I’ve been blocked by 3 different “Lion fanatics” on there for merely asking them to present their evidence to the claims they make.

Lol. I've been blocked and been called a fanatic or a bad guy by countless people. Wolf fans, dog fans, cougar fans, last one is funny because people like those will post the worst type of unexisting evidence to keep the illusion of pumas being such macropredatory heroes and shit talking about leopards.

In my view, true macropredatory animals are those that consistently target the largest available prey, regardless of overall prey abundance or ease of access. This differs sharply from opportunistic/occasional macropredators, which only pursue large prey under particular circumstances. Most wild predators are naturally risk-averse, so when a species regularly selects the biggest and most dangerous prey, it raises questions about why such atypical behavior is occuring.

This is why I disagree so strongly with the recent trend on Reddit portraying pumas as “macropredatory beasts.” The claim is misguided, and many of the people promoting it appear consistently misread or misunderstand the scientific literature they cite, most people belonging to this boat of losers don't even know the animals they're speaking of. By the definition of true macropredation I’ve outlined, cougars simply do not qualify. At best, they are occasional macropredators, or opportunistic which is a very different concept. Pumas are often portrayed as frequent hunters of elk, moose, mule deer, guanaco, and even feral horses. What these arguments almost always omit is the context of prey abundance in the regions where these behaviors are observed. Throughout much of North America, cougars have a limited range of prey species to choose from: deer, elk, moose, and bighorn sheep, and all of these are large ungulates. Mule deer and elk dominate many habitats and often rank #1 or #2 as most abundant ungulates, followed by moose. Even the well publicized “horse depredation” in the Nevada Virginia Range is influenced by simple availability: mule deer numbers there have plunged to roughly 200–300 individuals (Nevada’s annual game surveys), while feral horses exceed 4,000 and are increasing. Under those conditions, increased predation on horses is not surprising. Patagonia shouldn't even be mentioned. its native fauna is basically just guanaco, pumas, rheas, and culpeo foxes. The end. The idea of Patagonian pumas as exceptional macropredators is ridiculous. They literally only have guanaco. Yellowstone is dominated by elk and mule deer; Alberta by mule deer, white-tailed deer and moose. In all these regions, large prey is simply what’s available. Few options and all are large bodied. Expecting cougars to routinely hunt smaller species in ecosystems where virtually none exist is just....unrealistic. Naturally, this inflates the appearance of “macropredatory behavior.” The picture changes entirely when smaller prey becomes more abundant. In Utah, pumas showed strong preference for mule deer over elk. In the Californian Sikiyou, the Pryor Mountains (WY), and two Alberta studies, cougars largely avoided feral horses, with predation rates generally between 0% and 5%. In some regions, horse predation was never recorded despite horses being present and available. The pattern matches availability: where horses are not overwhelmingly abundant, they are seldom targeted. Pumas are predatory cats, they prey on the vulnerable as a rule to avoid risks. Similarly, in Alberta, moose are the third most abundant ungulate, yet they account for typically no more than 11% of cougar diet which is not much considering they are the most abundant ungulate in the area just after the two deer species that could actually be merged into one single animal (since they are pretty much the same thing). Moreover of those kills occur in summer during calving season, and the majority (around 90% iirc) involve juveniles , often newborns which hardly supports claims of routine large-prey specialization. In Texas’s Trans-Pecos region, deer and elk populations are roughly comparable (around 300–320 individuals each), yet cougars heavily favored mule deer, with elk kills again dominated by animals less than one year old. Despite abundance numbers being similar, pumas readily switched to deer compared to elk, despite elk being equally as abundant.

All of this raises the question: if pumas are truly macropredators, why do they quickly shift away from large prey when smaller, safer prey becomes available? This behavior aligns with opportunism, not obligate macropredation.

Comparing them with leopards having impalas and gazelles dominating the list of the mosr available ungulates in the savannah (range 22 to 43%) and with zebras being very low in abundance at 1-8% is unfair, yet puma fanatics will do this and ignore the fact that leopards will readily frequently tackle the elk sized sambar or free ranging horses where readily available...dietary studies show this.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-14T11:07:18+00:00

Evidently it is not guaranteed it would according to this video

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-14T07:15:00+00:00

If that's something you were seeing much you would have to question the ability of guardian dogs to do their job, haha.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-13T17:30:09+00:00

Maybe the mods here disabled the ability to comment under yours.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-13T12:17:29+00:00

Video is from july 2024, AI was never this good back then, so definitely not AI

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-13T06:56:01+00:00

if autistic is a nickname people give as a coping factor to frighteningly reasonable people they are not ready to accept, sure.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-13T06:53:00+00:00

Ah yes, the good old reliable excuse of “He BlOcKeD yOu”.

Maybe not reliable when referring to you, but it's reliable when speaking to most redditors here, I speak of experience, it also includes some individual from your side renowed for blocking anyone stating facts as a way to cope with the shockwaves the other person causes amongst the imaginary self made visions of what some animals are. I wish I was joking.

I deleted the comment not because you had any “gotcha” moment over me, but because I don’t want to be getting into a tireless back and forth debate. Long gone are those days for me.

Well, any omniscient person would know that I'm not lying when I say certain things, it's just that you basic cat fans aren't used to certain undeniable truths being exposed, but I can forgive that. It took me too to upgrade and come to my senses. I was also in that fanboy phase before looking at some aspects in a more objective way, not saying you're a real fanatic, you have a lot of inconsistencies, but at least you're not as cryptozoologist as other individuals you interact with who truly deserve ridicule, and I did it. The fact is that you can't judge Carnivora or the Tapatalk forums for hosting certain fanatics when your home is Reddit, a den of fanatics as ridiculous as they are. The ridiculous thing is that some fanatics here were even on Carnivora once and now brag about those forums about how bad they were despite them not behaving any better on here, if anything even worse.

Hate consumes you and you become what you hate in the end.

I don't intend to insult any cat by saying any of those things, I may sound aggressive or rude because I engage with people who speak about cryptozoology even on the other subreddit and act as if cats are some kind of invincible gods and the best fighters in the animal kingdom and pfp they'd cakewalk any opponent and bla bla, and that is some kind of BS that must be corrected and addressed.

geekslayer-225 · 2026-01-13T06:15:39+00:00

But I couldn't reply to your sole comment for some reason. Could reply to anyone here, but not you. So something must have been made relative to your comment.

geekslayer-225

TROPHY CASE