Smithsonian Magazine has an interesting story about some extinct saber-toothed animals.  The eight animals highlighted lived in various times – ranging from the Permian to more recent times.  The list includes saber-toothed cats, a giant plant eater, a newly discovered, huge carnivore from South Africa (Inostrancevia africana, which we posted on last week), and even a saber-toothed deer.  All are mammals or related to mammals.  It’s interesting that we don’t know of any saber-toothed dinosaurs…

Evolution has a fondness for saber-toothed creatures. Time and again, animals with elongated canine teeth have roamed the planet. The ferocious Smilodon of the Ice Age is among the most famous: a lion-sized cat with huge fangs that hunted ancient horses and bison across the Americas. But that’s only the tip of a saber-toothed history going back more than 250 million years.

Most of the time, paleontologists use the term “saber-toothed” for carnivorous mammals who use long, flattened canine teeth to puncture or shear away the flesh of other creatures. But the designation isn’t quite so simple. Other mammals and even proto-mammals have been called saber-toothed even though they’re herbivores, using very similar teeth to tussle with each other rather than bite into prey. On that score, there are technically still some saber-toothed animals around today. Male musk deer compete with each other every mating season by fighting with their fangs.