What kind of animal was this?
May 12, 2012 9:18 PM Subscribe
What kind of animal was this?
I was recently in an antique shop and they had this creepy skull for sale. They told me that they believed it was a coyote, but that they weren't sure. I wasn't able to get any backstory from them other then someone was using their space to sell it.
I'd like to find out what it was. It appears to be a bit big for a coyote to me, but I'm really curious if any of you have any ideas on what it might be? For a sense of scale, the table it's on is 15" in diameter.
So what do you think it is/was?
Thanks!
I was recently in an antique shop and they had this creepy skull for sale. They told me that they believed it was a coyote, but that they weren't sure. I wasn't able to get any backstory from them other then someone was using their space to sell it.
I'd like to find out what it was. It appears to be a bit big for a coyote to me, but I'm really curious if any of you have any ideas on what it might be? For a sense of scale, the table it's on is 15" in diameter.
So what do you think it is/was?
Thanks!
I agree, a sheep or a goat, or maybe a calf?
posted by hermitosis at 9:30 PM on May 12, 2012
posted by hermitosis at 9:30 PM on May 12, 2012
Not a predator.
I worked for a taxidermist for a while, and one of my jobs was boiling skulls. This has big eyes like prey, and as others have said, grinding teeth, like prey. It does not appear to have sockets for canine teeth that all predators have. It does look like it has a very large nasal area, which is what prey have.
Since there is nothing to compare the size with, that also makes it difficult to identify. Probably a deer (maybe young) or a youngish lamb if it seemed to be about the same size as a coyote head. Coyote heads should be about the size of or a little smaller than your average medium to medium large dog. (IMO. I only worked there for about 2 years, others who have done more than I did may have a better idea of what it is. I only boiled a handfull of skulls, but you can learn a lot from even one.)
wife of 445supermag
posted by 445supermag at 10:00 PM on May 12, 2012 [2 favorites]
I worked for a taxidermist for a while, and one of my jobs was boiling skulls. This has big eyes like prey, and as others have said, grinding teeth, like prey. It does not appear to have sockets for canine teeth that all predators have. It does look like it has a very large nasal area, which is what prey have.
Since there is nothing to compare the size with, that also makes it difficult to identify. Probably a deer (maybe young) or a youngish lamb if it seemed to be about the same size as a coyote head. Coyote heads should be about the size of or a little smaller than your average medium to medium large dog. (IMO. I only worked there for about 2 years, others who have done more than I did may have a better idea of what it is. I only boiled a handfull of skulls, but you can learn a lot from even one.)
wife of 445supermag
posted by 445supermag at 10:00 PM on May 12, 2012 [2 favorites]
It's really hard to to tell without the lower jaw, and the front protruding are seems to have broken off, so it could be a sheep/goat/deer/calf. Or a manbearpig.
posted by Drumhellz at 10:06 PM on May 12, 2012 [2 favorites]
posted by Drumhellz at 10:06 PM on May 12, 2012 [2 favorites]
Yeah, looks to be a cloven-hoofed animal of some type. From the overall shape, particularly the lacrimal fossa (recess) in front of the eye socket and the location of the infraorbital foramen (hole) above the front cheek tooth, it looks like a sheep.
posted by Pinback at 10:07 PM on May 12, 2012 [3 favorites]
posted by Pinback at 10:07 PM on May 12, 2012 [3 favorites]
Yeah, herbivore. How big is it? The eyes seem large relative to the skull, to me, but I don't know. I thought not cow but calf may be a good guess. Or a foal? The nose is a giveaway for horse, for me, but I don't know if foals' heads are shaped differently, and anyway the nose bones are pretty broken down. But the slope looks wrong.
I dunno, sheep or goat seems right for size, but the eye sockets seem too big, to me. Trying to extrapolate from my goats' live heads, and the previous dead sheep and goat heads I've seen ... hard to know, since I don't skin skulls and so rarely see them.
Pinback, tell me about the infraorbital foramen! Gonna go learn about it myself, too, but is it a sheep-only thing? or ?
posted by librarina at 10:08 PM on May 12, 2012
I dunno, sheep or goat seems right for size, but the eye sockets seem too big, to me. Trying to extrapolate from my goats' live heads, and the previous dead sheep and goat heads I've seen ... hard to know, since I don't skin skulls and so rarely see them.
Pinback, tell me about the infraorbital foramen! Gonna go learn about it myself, too, but is it a sheep-only thing? or ?
posted by librarina at 10:08 PM on May 12, 2012
I'm not an expert by any means, but looking at complete skulls of most common cloven hoofed herbivores it seemed the obvious defining areas were in the lower jaw and nose areas. I'd bet pinback is correct though.
posted by Drumhellz at 10:29 PM on May 12, 2012
posted by Drumhellz at 10:29 PM on May 12, 2012
librarina - not a sheep only thing, but the size of the skull & the size / location of the infraorbital foramen (hole where various nerves, etc, leave the skull) are pretty diagnostic of a cloven-hoofed animal. It helps to remember that they have very mobile & sensitive lips, hence the size & location of the hole - lots of nerves go there. And it's obviously not a horse or any type of bovine animal (wrong size & totally wrong shape).
It's a bit hard to be more definite, given the skull above the sinus is mostly gone (the shape of that is also handy for ID), but goats typically don't have much of a recess for the tear glands (lacrima fossa), and that one seems particularly square and sheep-like to me. The shape of the upper jaw too, with that big step in part-way along the cheek and the tuberosity (bump) right above where that starts, screams "sheep!" rather than goat.
That said, I'm certainly no expert - my knowledge comes from a lifetime's vague interest, finding various skulls lying around over the years, and a very basic animal "skull, bones, and scats" subject at uni, so I'd happily defer to a real expert. And I sure as hell have no knowledge whatsoever of North American animals, so it could easily be some native herbivore with a vaguely sheep-like head. But comparing it to other pictures (like the particularly clear and well-annotated ones in this paper), I reckon it's a sheep ;-)
Oh, and for future askers of similar questions: good photos of the roof of the mouth & crowns of the teeth are very helpful!
posted by Pinback at 10:45 PM on May 12, 2012 [2 favorites]
It's a bit hard to be more definite, given the skull above the sinus is mostly gone (the shape of that is also handy for ID), but goats typically don't have much of a recess for the tear glands (lacrima fossa), and that one seems particularly square and sheep-like to me. The shape of the upper jaw too, with that big step in part-way along the cheek and the tuberosity (bump) right above where that starts, screams "sheep!" rather than goat.
That said, I'm certainly no expert - my knowledge comes from a lifetime's vague interest, finding various skulls lying around over the years, and a very basic animal "skull, bones, and scats" subject at uni, so I'd happily defer to a real expert. And I sure as hell have no knowledge whatsoever of North American animals, so it could easily be some native herbivore with a vaguely sheep-like head. But comparing it to other pictures (like the particularly clear and well-annotated ones in this paper), I reckon it's a sheep ;-)
Oh, and for future askers of similar questions: good photos of the roof of the mouth & crowns of the teeth are very helpful!
posted by Pinback at 10:45 PM on May 12, 2012 [2 favorites]
Definitely a sheep-like herbivore. The teeth and the overall skull shape make it absolutely clear this is in no way a coyote or even close to such a beast.
posted by Decani at 2:57 AM on May 13, 2012
posted by Decani at 2:57 AM on May 13, 2012
Yeah definitely not a calf, totally wrong shape. /Grew-up-on-farm-too-many-bones-on-long-walks.
My vote is also with lamb.
posted by smoke at 3:53 AM on May 13, 2012
My vote is also with lamb.
posted by smoke at 3:53 AM on May 13, 2012
Sheep do come in lots of different sizes. An adult Shetland might be comparable in size to a few-months-old large meat breed. I'm no expert but this doesn't look like a deer or cow or horse. Sheep was my first conclusion too.
posted by Lou Stuells at 7:25 AM on May 13, 2012
posted by Lou Stuells at 7:25 AM on May 13, 2012
I am with the lamb crew on this one. The teeth obviously place the animal in the herbivore category. The rest is just my best guess.
posted by MyMind at 11:05 AM on May 13, 2012
posted by MyMind at 11:05 AM on May 13, 2012
Definitely not a deer. Or, for that matter, an elk. Those are the two kinds of large herbivore skulls I have, and the shape of the cranium is very different. Yours is much shorter from back to front. Sheep makes sense to me, though I can't back that up with direct experience of sheep skulls.
posted by Because at 10:32 PM on May 13, 2012
posted by Because at 10:32 PM on May 13, 2012
This thread is closed to new comments.
Maybe a sheep?
posted by miss patrish at 9:26 PM on May 12, 2012