This article needs additional citations for verification .(October 2015) |
Caprinae Temporal range: | |
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Stone sheep (Ovis dalli stonei) in British Columbia, 2009 | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Mammalia |
Order: | Artiodactyla |
Family: | Bovidae |
Subfamily: | Caprinae J. E. Gray, 1821 |
Tribes | |
The subfamily Caprinae, [1] also sometimes referred to as the tribe Caprini, [2] is part of the ruminant family Bovidae, [3] and consists of mostly medium-sized bovids. A member of this subfamily is called a caprine. [4]
Prominent members include sheep and goats, with some other members referred to as goat antelopes. Some earlier taxonomies considered Caprinae a separate family called Capridae (with the members being caprids), but now it is usually considered either a subfamily within the Bovidae, or a tribe within the subfamily Antilopinae of the family Bovidae, with caprines being a type of bovid.
Although most goat-antelopes are gregarious and have fairly stocky builds, they diverge in many other ways – the muskox (Ovibos moschatus) is adapted to the extreme cold of the tundra; the mountain goat (Oreamnos americanus) of North America is specialised for very rugged terrain; the urial (Ovis orientalis) occupies a largely infertile area from Kashmir to Iran, including much desert country. The Armenian mouflon (Ovis gmelini gmelini) is thought to be the ancestor of the modern domestic sheep (Ovis aries).
Many species have become extinct since the last ice age, probably largely because of human interaction. Of the survivors:
Members of the group vary considerably in size, from just over 1 m (3 ft) long for a full-grown grey goral (Nemorhaedus goral), to almost 2.5 m (8 ft 2 in) long for a musk ox, and from under 30 kg (66 lb) to more than 350 kg (770 lb). Musk oxen in captivity have reached over 650 kg (1,430 lb).[ citation needed ]
The lifestyles of caprids fall into two broad classes: 'resource-defenders', which are territorial and defend a small, food-rich area against other members of the same species; and 'grazers', which gather together into herds and roam freely over a larger, usually relatively infertile area.
The resource-defenders are the more primitive group: they tend to be smaller in size, dark in colour, males and females fairly alike, have long, tessellated ears, long manes, and dagger-shaped horns. The grazers (sometimes collectively known as tsoan caprids, from the Hebrew tso'n meaning sheep and goats) evolved more recently. They tend to be larger, highly social, and rather than mark territory with scent glands, they have highly evolved dominance behaviours. No sharp line divides the groups, but a continuum varies from the serows at one end of the spectrum to sheep, true goats, and musk oxen at the other.
The goat-antelope, or caprid, group is known from as early as the Miocene, when members of the group resembled the modern serow in their general body form. [5] The group did not reach its greatest diversity until the recent ice ages, when many of its members became specialised for marginal, often extreme, environments: mountains, deserts, and the subarctic region.
The ancestors of the modern sheep and goats (both rather vague and ill-defined terms) are thought to have moved into mountainous regions – sheep becoming specialised occupants of the foothills and nearby plains, and relying on flight and flocking for defence against predators, and goats adapting to very steep terrain where predators are at a disadvantage.
Internal relationships of Caprinae based on mitochondrial DNA. [6]
Bovidae |
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Phylogeny based on Hassanin et al., 2009 and Calamari, 2021. [7] [8]
Family Bovidae
Tribe or subtribe | Image | Genus | Species |
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Caprini or Caprina | Ammotragus (Blyth, 1840) |
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Arabitragus Ropiquet & Hassanin, 2005 |
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Budorcas Hodgson, 1850 |
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Capra Linnaeus, 1758 |
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Hemitragus (Hodgson, 1841) |
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Nilgiritragus Ropiquet & Hassanin, 2005 |
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Oreamnos Rafinesque, 1817 |
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Ovis Linnaeus, 1758 |
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Pseudois Hodgson, 1846 |
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Rupicapra Garsault, 1764 |
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† Myotragus Bate, 1909 | |||
Ovibovini or Ovibovina | Capricornis Ogilby, 1837 |
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Nemorhaedus Hamilton Smith, 1827 |
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Ovibos Blainville, 1816 |
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Pantholopini or Pantholopina | Pantholops Hodgson, 1834 |
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The following extinct genera of Caprinae have been identified: [9] [10]
The Bovidae comprise the biological family of cloven-hoofed, ruminant mammals that includes cattle, yaks, bison, buffalo, antelopes, sheep and goats. A member of this family is called a bovid. With 143 extant species and 300 known extinct species, the family Bovidae consists of 11 major subfamilies and thirteen major tribes. The family evolved 20 million years ago, in the early Miocene.
Musk deer can refer to any one, or all seven, of the species that make up Moschus, the only extant genus of the family Moschidae. Despite being commonly called deer, they are not true deer belonging to the family Cervidae, but rather their family is closely related to Bovidae, the group that contains antelopes, bovines, sheep, and goats. The musk deer family differs from cervids, or true deer, by lacking antlers and preorbital glands also, possessing only a single pair of teats, a gallbladder, a caudal gland, a pair of canine tusks and—of particular economic importance to humans—a musk gland.
The muskox, also spelled musk ox and musk-ox, plural muskoxen or musk oxen, is a hoofed mammal of the family Bovidae. Native to the Arctic, it is noted for its thick coat and for the strong odor emitted by males during the seasonal rut, from which its name derives. This musky odor has the effect of attracting females during mating season. Its Inuktitut name "umingmak" translates to "the bearded one".
The bovid subfamily Reduncinae or tribe Reduncini is composed of nine species of antelope, all of which dwell in marshes, floodplains, or other well-watered areas, including the waterbucks and reedbucks. These antelopes first appear in the fossil record 7.4 million years ago in Eurasia and 6.6 Mya in Africa.
Capra is a genus of mammals, the goats, comprising ten species, including the markhor and several species known as ibexes. The domestic goat is a domesticated species derived from the bezoar ibex. Evidence of goat domestication dates back more than 8,500 years.
The takin, also called cattle chamois or gnu goat, is a large species of ungulate of the subfamily Caprinae found in the eastern Himalayas. It includes four subspecies: the Mishmi takin, the golden takin, the Tibetan takin, and the Bhutan takin.
The Tibetan antelope or chiru is a medium-sized bovid native to the northeastern Tibetan plateau. Most of the population live within the Chinese border, while some scatter across India and Bhutan in the high altitude plains, hill plateau and montane valley. Fewer than 150,000 mature individuals are left in the wild, but the population is currently thought to be increasing. In 1980s and 1990s, they had become endangered due to massive illegal poaching. They are hunted for their extremely soft, light and warm underfur which is usually obtained after death. This underfur, known as shahtoosh, is used to weave luxury shawls. Shahtoosh shawls were traditionally given as wedding gifts in India and it takes the underfur of three to five adult antelopes to make one shawl. Despite strict controls on trade of shahtoosh products and CITES listing, there is still demand for these luxury items. Within India, shawls are worth $1,000–$5,000; internationally the price can reach as high as $20,000. In 1997 the Chinese government established the Hoh Xil National Nature Reserve solely to protect the Tibetan antelope population.
Myotragus is an extinct genus of goat-antelope in the tribe Caprini which lived on the Balearic Islands of Mallorca and Menorca in the western Mediterranean until its extinction around 4,500 years ago. The fossil record of Myotragus on the Balearic Islands extends over 5 million years back to the early Pliocene on Mallorca, where it presumably arrived after the evaporation of the Mediterranean Sea during the Messinian Salinity Crisis.
Ovis is a genus of mammals, part of the Caprinae subfamily of the ruminant family Bovidae. Its seven highly sociable species are known as sheep or ovines. Domestic sheep are members of the genus, and are thought to be descended from the wild mouflon of central and southwest Asia.
The Antilocapridae are a family of ruminant artiodactyls endemic to North America. Their closest extant relatives are the giraffids. Only one species, the pronghorn, is living today; all other members of the family are extinct. The living pronghorn is a small ruminant mammal resembling an antelope.
Caprinid may refer to animals in the following groups:
Bootherium is an extinct bovid genus from the middle to late Pleistocene of North America which contains a single species, Bootherium bombifrons. Vernacular names for Bootherium include Harlan's muskox, woodox, woodland muskox, helmeted muskox, or bonnet-headed muskox.
Bovidae in Chinese mythology include various myths and legends about a group of biologically distinct animals which form important motifs within Chinese mythology. There are many myths about the animals modernly classified as Bovidae, referring to oxen, sheep, goats, and mythological types such as "unicorns". Chinese mythology refers to those myths found in the historical geographic area of China, a geographic area which has evolved or changed somewhat through history. Thus this includes myths in Chinese and other languages, as transmitted by Han Chinese as well as other ethnic groups. There are various motifs of animals of the Bovidae biological family in Chinese mythology. These have often served as allusions in poetry and other literature. Some species are also used in the traditional Chinese calendar and time-keeping system.
Saigini is a tribe of artiodactyl mammals of the Bovidae family, subfamily Antilopinae, comprising two species of medium-sized antelopes that inhabit the Eurasian steppes.
Goat evolution is the process by which domestic goats came to exist through evolution by natural selection. Wild goats — medium-sized mammals which are found in noticeably harsh environments, particularly forests and mountains, in the Middle East and Central Asia — were one of the first species domesticated by modern humans, with the date of domestication generally considered to be 8,000 BC. Goats are part of the family Bovidae, a broad and populous group which includes a variety of ruminants such as bison, cows and sheep. Bovids all share many traits, such as hooves and a herbivorous diet and all males, along with many females, have horns. Bovids began to diverge from deer and giraffids during the early Miocene epoch. The subfamily Caprinae, which includes goats, ibex and sheep, are considered to have diverged from the rest of Bovidae as early as the late Miocene, with the group reaching its greatest diversity in the ice ages.
The Balearean boc also known as the Majorcan wild goat, is a caprid present on the Balearic Islands in Spain. Being the only big game species that exists in the Balearic Islands, it has attracted attention from international hunters, particularly from the United States, where the SCI included it as a game species in 2004. The CIC and the National Board of Trophy Hunting Homologation included it in 2009 and 2008 respectively.
Megalovis is an extinct genus of bovid that lived in Eurasia during the Plio-Pleistocene.