Category:Palaeonictis

Palaeonictis is an extinct hyena-like Creodont belonging to the family Oxyaenidae ranging from the late Paleocene to the mid-Eocene. In life, it would have resembled a large wolverine. This Oxyaenid had heavy jaws and blunt robust teeth more suited for crushing bones than slicing meat, which means that the plantigrade(flat-footed) Palaeonictis was at least a part-time scavenger. The biggest species Palaeonictis peloria(meaning terrible ancient weasel) is known from an incomplete jaw from the latest Paleocene in Wyoming U.S.A. that must have measured 20 cm. in length. This animal was the largest carnivore in its ecosystem. 55 million years ago, P. occidentalist(the size of a bear) evolved into the smaller P. wingi(the size of a coyote) within 200,000 years in the early Eocene due to "Global Warming"(Paleoclimatology). By the middle Eocene(38 million years ago) Palaeonictis disappeared from North America, and by the the late Eocene(34 MYA) the last species P. gigantea had vanished from Europe. In fact, the entire Oxyaenidae family had become extinct worldwide(although its sister group Hyaenodontidae continued to thrive for awhile). This was due to increased competition during the middle Eocene from Miacids and Nimravids belonging to the more successful Order Carnivora, which eventually replaced Creodonta(in the later Tertiary) as the worlds top predators.

Source: Journal of Mammalian Evolution " A New Small-Bodied Species of Palaeonictis(Creodonta,Oxyaenidae) from the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum". By Stephen Chester, Jonathan Bloch, Ross Secord, Doug Boyer.(2010)

• Included species (for TPDB,  19 July 2012):

P. gigantea, P. occidentalis, P. peloria, P. wingi

• Fossilworks PaleoDB link: Palaeonictis de Blainville 1842 (extinct)

Palaeonictis 

genus of extinct placental mammals
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Instance of	fossil taxon
Common name עברית: פלאוניקטיס 中文: 古拟猫兽属 中文（中国大陆）: 古拟猫兽属 中文（简体）: 古拟猫兽属
Taxonomy Superclass Tetrapoda Class Mammalia Subclass Theria Clade Eutheria Infraclass Placentalia Magnorder Boreoeutheria Superorder Laurasiatheria Clade Scrotifera Grandorder Ferungulata Mirorder Ferae Clade Pan-Carnivora Order Oxyaenodonta Family Oxyaenidae Subfamily Palaeonictinae Genus Palaeonictis
Taxon author	Henri Marie Ducrotay de Blainville, 1842
Authority file  Q7126460 Fossilworks taxon ID: 40962 GBIF taxon ID: 4831352 IRMNG ID: 1294929 Reasonator Scholia Wikidocumentaries PetScan statistics WikiMap Locator tool KML file Search depicted Files depicting this taxon