Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Competition With Cats Drove Dogs to Extinction?


Over at Science Daily
, we find this improbably headline: Competition from cats drove extinction of many species of ancient dogs.  The summary?

Competition played a more important role in the evolution of the dog family (wolves, foxes, and their relatives) than climate change, shows a new international study. Researchers analyzed over 2000 fossils and revealed that the arrival of felids to North America from Asia had a deadly impact on the diversity of the dog family, contributing to the extinction of as many as 40 of their species.

Lucas M. says he thinks cartoonists will be all over this. I bet he's right!

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