Leopardus

Leopardus[2]
Temporal range: Pleistocene-Recent[1]
~2.5–0 Ma
↓
Leopardus species from top-left, clockwise: ocelot (L. pardalis), oncilla (L. tigrinus), Pampas cat (L. colocola), kodkod (L. guigna), margay (L. wiedii), Geoffroy's cat (L. geoffroyi)
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Carnivora
Suborder: Feliformia
Family: Felidae
Subfamily: Felinae
Genus: Leopardus
Gray, 1842
Type species
Felis pardalis
Linnaeus, 1758
Leopardus range map
Leopardus distribution

Leopardus is a genus comprising eight species of small cats native to the Americas.[3] This genus is considered the oldest branch of a genetic lineage of small cats in the Americas whose common ancestor crossed the Bering land bridge from Asia to North America in the late Miocene.[4]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference Berta1983 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Wozencraft, W. C. (2005). "Genus Leopardus". In Wilson, D. E.; Reeder, D. M. (eds.). Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3rd ed.). Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 537–540. ISBN 978-0-8018-8221-0. OCLC 62265494.
  3. ^ Kitchener, A. C.; Breitenmoser-Würsten, C.; Eizirik, E.; Gentry, A.; Werdelin, L.; Wilting, A.; Yamaguchi, N.; Abramov, A. V.; Christiansen, P.; Driscoll, C.; Duckworth, J. W.; Johnson, W.; Luo, S.-J.; Meijaard, E.; O’Donoghue, P.; Sanderson, J.; Seymour, K.; Bruford, M.; Groves, C.; Hoffmann, M.; Nowell, K.; Timmons, Z.; Tobe, S. (2017). "A revised taxonomy of the Felidae: The final report of the Cat Classification Task Force of the IUCN Cat Specialist Group" (PDF). Cat News (Special Issue 11): 46–58.
  4. ^ Johnson, W. E.; Eizerik, E.; Pecon-Slattery, J.; Murphy, W. J.; Antunes, A.; Teeling, E. & O'Brien, S. J. (2006). "The Late Miocene radiation of modern Felidae: A genetic assessment". Science. 311 (5757): 73–77. Bibcode:2006Sci...311...73J. doi:10.1126/science.1122277. PMID 16400146. S2CID 41672825.