Biology:Giant hutia
| Giant hutias | |
|---|---|
Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Rodentia |
| Suborder: | Hystricomorpha |
| Infraorder: | Hystricognathi |
| Parvorder: | Caviomorpha |
| Superfamily: | Chinchilloidea |
| Family: | †Heptaxodontidae Anthony, 1917 |
| Genera | |
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†Amblyrhiza | |
The giant hutias are an extinct group of large rodents known from fossil and subfossil material in the West Indies. One species, Amblyrhiza inundata, is estimated to have weighed between 50 and 200 kg (110 and 440 lb), big specimens being as large as an American black bear. This is twice as large as the capybara, the largest rodent living today, but still much smaller than Josephoartigasia monesi, the largest rodent known. These animals were probably used as a food source by aboriginal humans. All giant hutias are in a single family, Heptaxodontidae, which contains no living species; this grouping seems to be paraphyletic and arbitrary, however.
One of the smaller species, Quemisia gravis, may have survived as late as when the Spanish began to colonize the Caribbean.[1]
Despite its name, Heptaxodontidae is not closely related to the extant hutias of the family Echimyidae; Heptaxodontidae is thought to be more closely related to the chinchillas.[2]
Taxonomy
The giant hutias are divided into two subfamilies, five genera, and six species.
- Family Heptaxodontidae
- Subfamily Heptaxodontinae
- Genus Amblyrhiza
- Amblyrhiza inundata from Anguilla and St. Martin
- Genus Elasmodontomys
- Elasmodontomys obliquus from Puerto Rico
- Genus Quemisia
- Quemisia gravis from Hispaniola
- Genus Xaymaca
- Xaymaca fulvopulvis from Jamaica
- Genus Amblyrhiza
- Subfamily Clidomyinae
- Genus Clidomys
- Clidomys osborni from Jamaica
- Genus Clidomys
- Subfamily Heptaxodontinae
See also
References
- ↑ Day, David (1989). Vanished Species. New York: Gallery Books. p. 236. ISBN 9780831727826. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Vanished_Species/owYKAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=quemisia+spanish&dq=quemisia+spanish&printsec=frontcover#spf=1597751989654.
- ↑ Fabre, Pierre-Henri; Vilstrup, Julia T.; Raghavan, Maanasa; Der Sarkissian, Clio; Willerslev, Eske; Douzery, Emmanuel J. P.; Orlando, Ludovic (July 2014). "Rodents of the Caribbean: origin and diversification of hutias unravelled by next-generation museomics". Biology Letters 10 (7). doi:10.1098/rsbl.2014.0266. ISSN 1744-9561. PMID 25115033. PMC 4126619. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4126619/.
Bibliography
- Biknevicius, A. R.; McFarlane, Donald A. & MacPhee, R. D. E. (1993): Body size in Amblyrhiza inundata (Rodentia: Caviomorpha), an extinct megafaunal rodent from the Anguilla Bank, West Indies: estimates and implications. American Museum Novitates 3079: 1-26. PDF fulltext
- MacPhee, R. D. E. & Flemming, C. (2003): A possible heptaxodontine and other caviidan rodents from the Quaternary of Jamaica. American Museum Novitates 3422: 1-42. PDF fulltext
- Nowak, Ronald M. 1999. Walker's Mammals of the World, 6th edition. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1936 ISBN:0-8018-5789-9
- Woods, C. A. 1989. Biogeography of West Indian rodents. Pages 741–797 in Biogeography of the West Indies: Past Present and Future. Sandhill Crane Press, Gainesville.
- Woods, C.A.; Paéz, R.C.; Kilpatrick, C.W. (2001). "Insular Patterns and Radiations of West Indian Rodents". in Woods, C.A.; Sergile, F.E.. Biogeography of the West Indies: Patterns and Perspectives. Boca Raton, London, New York, and Washington, D.C.: CRC Press. pp. 335–354. doi:10.1201/9781420039481-18. ISBN 978-0-8493-2001-9. https://books.google.com/books?id=f33LBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA335.
Wikidata ☰ Q970593 entry
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