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Why are there big cats but no big dogs?

N

Narmer

Diamond Member
Lions, tigers, jaguars, leopards, even hyenas are related to the common cat. However, even though dogs may vary, they cannot match the size and strength of big cats. Why?
 
wtf are you talking about?

Clifford-the-Big-Red-Dog-40th-Anniversary-Edition.jpg
 
Different evolutionary pressures? Wolves hunt in packs and are as large as they need to be to survive and thrive that way. Cats are solitary hunters and evolved to survive and thrive as solitary hunters.
 
Linflas said:
Different evolutionary pressures? Wolves hunt in packs and are as large as they need to be to survive and thrive that way. Cats are solitary hunters and evolved to survive and thrive as solitary hunters.
Click to expand...
Lions are very large and they hunt in packs.
 
Kinda like the difference between sprinters and marathon runners. Maybe because dogs evolved to be endurance runners, to wear their prey down long-distance, not in a sprint. Cats are ambush hunters. They are built for a short, powerful dash.

Generally speaking.
 
A quick Google search says Epicyon Haydeni was the largest canine that ever lived and was larger then a modern lion, so they definitely can get bigger, but during the time period this was still smaller then the largest cats. Exactly why modern animals are smaller then prehistoric ones is unknown. For that matter, exactly why mammals never got as large as dinosaurs is unknown.

One possible answer is that for canines to be as large as cats they would have to become cats. For an insect to become larger it would require lungs, which in turn would require red blood cells, etc. until it evolved into an animal. Similarly, for a canine to compete with large cats it may be necessary for it adopt more of their physiology.

For example, many of the larger predators like lions and bears are older species that have simpler physiologies then canines and are more resistant to inbreeding. If food becomes scarce and their population declines being able to avoid inbreeding can then be a huge advantage that can mean the difference between survival and extinction. Likewise, reptiles like crocodilians have yet again simpler physiologies and the largest one ever was bigger then T Rex.
 
wuliheron said:
Exactly why modern animals are smaller then prehistoric ones is unknown. For that matter, exactly why mammals never got as large as dinosaurs is unknown.
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IIRC dinosaurs were able to grow so large because there was a higher concentration of O2.

As to why there are large cats and not dogs, I would take a guess and say maybe the large cats developed first and became the predator of the larger animals, so dogs evolved to take down smaller prey and didn't need a larger body.
Though, it may have something to do with dogs have large litters as opposed to cats having smaller litters, at least amongst the larger cats.
 
dennilfloss said:
Kinda like the difference between sprinters and marathon runners. Maybe because dogs evolved to be endurance runners, to wear their prey down long-distance, not in a sprint. Cats are ambush hunters. They are built for a short, powerful dash.

Generally speaking.
Click to expand...

You're correct. Dogs are cursorial pack hunters and cats are solitary ambush predators. Lions are atypical cats in that they hunt in packs, but they're still ambush predators.

wuliheron said:
A quick Google search says Epicyon Haydeni was the largest canine that ever lived and was larger then a modern lion, so they definitely can get bigger, but during the time period this was still smaller then the largest cats. Exactly why modern animals are smaller then prehistoric ones is unknown. For that matter, exactly why mammals never got as large as dinosaurs is unknown.
Click to expand...

Not really. Mammalian bone physiology explains much of why there are no sauropod-sized mammals. Essentially, the bigger dinosaurs had air sacs in their skeletons much like modern birds, so their bones could take up more volume while maintaining a certain mass (they're less dense). No mammal has evolved a similar solution.
 
Some mammals did get as large as dinosaurs. For example, Indricotherium compared well with a medium-sized sauropod.
 
Gigantopithecus said:
You're correct. Dogs are cursorial pack hunters and cats are solitary ambush predators. Lions are atypical cats in that they hunt in packs, but they're still ambush predators.



Not really. Mammalian bone physiology explains much of why there are no sauropod-sized mammals. Essentially, the bigger dinosaurs had air sacs in their skeletons much like modern birds, so their bones could take up more volume while maintaining a certain mass (they're less dense). No mammal has evolved a similar solution.
Click to expand...

I know this is your area, so I'll ask you instead of googling - isn't there a general trend of predators/prey to both get larger over time? If that's true, given enough time and a large enough populations, might we hypothetically expect mammals to find this or maybe some other solution, and then reach dino-like sizes on land?
 
Dogs = pack animals, there's no need for them to be huge to take down their prey.
Cats = solitary hunters (usually), needs to be bigger/stronger to take down prey solo.

Evolution at work folks, nothing to see here.
 
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