My sister's cat [View all]

[csziggy]

No, I'm not lost from the Pets Group. I've posted before about the species for which my sister found the paratype fossil and which was named for her. Now the University of Florida Natural History Museum has a page about it:

Rhizosmilodon fiteae

UF 124634, holotype right mandible

Quick Facts

Common Name: Fite’s saber-tooth cat

Rhizosmilodon fiteae is a small-sized, saber-toothed cat known only from Florida; but most species of felids have large geographic ranges, so it would not be surprising to find its fossils in other areas of North America.

Rhizosmilodon fitae weighed about 165 lbs., the same as a medium-sized, modern jaguar (Panthera onca) or slightly larger than an average modern cougar (Puma concolor).

It was most likely primarily an ambush predator, and probably preferred prey such as deer, peccaries, small tapirs, and small horses.

Age Range

Early Pliocene Epoch; late Hemphillian land mammal age
About 4.5 to 5 million years ago

Scientific Name and Classification

Rhizosmilodon fiteae Wallace & Hulbert, 2013

Source of Species Name: named for Barbara Fite of Lutz, Florida, who donated the paratype specimen to the Florida Museum of Natural History.

Classification: Mammalia, Eutheria, Laurasiatheria, Carnivora, Feliformia, Aeluroidea, Felidae, Machairodontinae, Smilodontini

Alternate Species Names: Megantereon hesperus sensu Berta and Galiano (1983)

More: https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/florida-vertebrate-fossils/species/rhizosmilodon-fiteae/