Extinct mammals list?
Extinction might be the safest event ever. When an animal is lost and will never be seen again. It may be sad but it does leave room for questioning. Why it went it extinct, How, Who, etc. But my question is what if. Imagine if you will you had the ability to instantly revive 7 species of mammal one from each continent. What would you choose? This may come across as a silly and childish question but it is one that keeps me up at night. I am curious what other peoples list’s are. My list is a bit cheating as it has 2 from 1 continent twice but it’s my rules so I can do what I please.
North america: Sea mink
South america: Falklands island wolf
Africa: Bluebuck
Asia: Japanese otter
Australia/Oceania: Thylacine
North america: Caribbean monk seal
Africa: Red gazelle
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12 Comments
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tomeslice
I’d have to think about it for a little bit, but just off the top of my head:
One of the giant lemurs from Africa
Saola if it’s extinct – I’d bring it right back.
Of course thylacine
Giant ground sloth from S. America
Any mammoth from Europe would be amazing to see, and North America’s Sabre-toothed tiger 😁Did I go to far out in history?
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kylecmsmith
Interesting question. Do you mean what we think would be cool to see alive, or what we would choose to revive permanently? I answered both interpretations.
Would be cool to see, but probably couldn’t/shouldn’t be permanently revived:
Africa: Australopithecus (it would be fascinating and informative to see the behavior of one of our early ancestors)
Asia: Gigantopithecus (biggest primate ever)
Europe: Paraceratherium (seeing the biggest land mammal ever would be amazing)
Oceania: Thylacosmilus (I’d be curious to see how its saber tooth works in real life)
North America: Woolly mammoth (just seem like they’d be incredible to see alive)
South America: Megatherium (I’m curious how similar or different giant ground sloths behave compared to living sloths)
Antarctica: Astrapotheria (I’d never heard of this order until trying to find an answer for this question. Apparently some of these lived in Antarctica, and they sound super weird)Would bring back to live with the hopes they could establish populations and survive:
Africa: Archaeoindris (extinct lemur the size of a gorilla)
Asia: Steller’s sea cow (biggest sirenian ever)
Europe: Irish elk (biggest cervid ever)
Oceania: Thylacine (Tasmanian tiger)
North America: Salish wool dog (a domesticated dog breed, but a very interesting one that was driven extinct when Europeans colonized the Pacific Northwest)
South America: Falkland Islands wolf (unique canid observed by Darwin)
Antarctica: I’m not aware of any that could survive today -
Warren Gilson
When I was young, popular fantasy author Robert Silverberg wrote a non-fiction book for middle graders called The Dodo, The Auk and the Oryx detailing extinctions and near extinctions which fascinated and appalled me. I read it many times. Now in 2024 researchers at the University of Melbourne are targeting the thylacine for de-extinction using the fat-tailed dunnart as a surrogate. There is the argument that any species brought back needs to have a place in todays ecosystem but for species driven extinct by man, I would support this work, particularly on unique and keystone animals like the thylacine.
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Speaker_for_the_lost
Considering that the Late Pleistocene megafauna almost certainly would be around (though in reduced numbers depending on species; habitat requirements varied massively among the extinct megafauna), my list is mostly filled with those species (in both the “would be cool to see them” and “they are a missing part of still-existing ecosystems” sense)…PLUS the sites where they might be around and be viewable (areas where the ecosystem they lived, and in the case of carnivores potential prey, remains) if we hadn’t caused their demise.
North America: Arctodus simus (Yellowstone)
South America: Smilodon populator (Kaa-Lya; Smilodon was actually similar to large Panthera in eating habits and could survive on tapirs and such, it’s just that even those were in short supply for a time following human colonization of South America)
Africa: Tretretre/Sloth lemur (Masaloa)
Asia: Mammuthus primigenimus (Hustai; as a steppe specialist I would expect this one to be present only in reduced numbers even without humans)
Europe: Aurochs
Australia: Thylacoleo carnifex (Kakadu; significant amounts of woodland/forest habitat remains in northern AUS and it presumably could now survive on the larger ferals) -
Speaker_for_the_lost
As for mammals where humans couldn’t possibly be involved in their demise…
North America: Daeodon
South America: Thylacosmilus
Europe: Chalicotherium
Asia: Dinocrocuta
Africa: Megistotherium (probably the largest mammalian land carnivore if you exclude all the omnivores)
Australia: Obdurodon
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Jon Hall
It depends on how recent the extinctions are. I’d love to see a thylacaleo for example. But more recently Steller’s Sea Cow is up there for me.