#color morph

[blackbackedjackal]

black & tan coyote by cliveh

[snommie]

New stickers in the shop!! The vinyl is transparent, so once you peel em you can see their whiskers :3

You can find my shop here

[doglover43]

piebald deer 🦴

[ratlegs]

Spotless Cheetah, photographed by Guy Combes

[tysonfurybattlepass]

Why do so many cats come in melanistic, but not all of them? I want to see an all black cheetah not just like a king cheetah which are awesome too but still.

i had to look this one up, because i honestly did not know! and the results are fascinating, to say the least.

turns out, melanism has evolved multiple different times across different genera of cats! the cop-out answer could be that cheetahs simply haven’t evolved complete melanism yet, but there are some other potential reasons to explore.

in Lucas Gonçalves da Silva’s publication simply titled Big Cats, he dedicates an entire chapter to the ecology and potential evolution of melanism in leopards and jaguars (the only big cats known to display complete melanism)

in his research, he found that the rate of melanism in both cats is around 10% of the sample groups, but there is a very strong correlation between living in dense, wet forests and the greater frequency of melanism.

in fact, melanism was completely absent from jaguar populations that lived in open floodplains areas, while the phenotype appeared at predictable rates in closed forest habitats.

so based on these trends, it seems that melanism is particularly linked to living in areas with high moisture, high temperature, and dense foliage, while being less common in open and flat terrain. it follows this trend, then, that cats like lions (and cheetahs, though they are not part of the genus being studied here), who live primarily in open grassland habitats, would probably not develop complete melanism in any significant population.

(that being said, though, servals have been known to come in all black, so these trends seem to be specific to the panthera genus, and it isn’t anything more than a hypothesis anyway.)

we still aren’t 100% sure why melanism is linked to wetter forested environments in larger species. it could be simply more advantageous in that environment, and thus naturally selected for (neutral polymorphism), but da Silva suggests that this might not be the case. rather, factors such as humidity and temperature may influence the development of the genes which code for coloring, causing the phenotype to appear more frequently.

here’s a link to the chapter about melanism in panthera, i highly recommend taking a look at it:

[tggardens]

A bonus shot of a little Red Koi isopod hanging out on a Lemon Button Fern leaf.

[canisoccidentalis]

A piebald coyote. The first image looks very dog-like, though the second one not so much?

Taken from taxidermy.net.

[dogwise]

Albino Barred Owlet

[arthistoryanimalia]

For #WatercolorWednesday:

Samuel Daniell (British, 1775–1811) A Landscape in Ceylon, With Barking Deer and Fawn and a Pair of Paradise Fly-Catchers between 1808 and 1811 Watercolor, over graphite, with pen in brown ink and gouache on medium, moderately textured, beige, wove paper Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection, B2006.14.16.

The pecies depicted are the Southern Red Muntjac (Muntiacus muntjak) and white morph Indian Paradise Flycatcher (Terpsiphone paradisi).

[bones-n-bookles]

Collection of mummies I have 💕

Brindle coyote head, grey fox head, painted coyote heart + his heart worms in a jar, wolf eye, goat heart, and coyote paw

All except the paw come from @blackbackedjackal and all are in excellent condition 💕

[velvetedantler]

Appears that the right sleeve of my cross fox fur jacket was made from a whitemark cross! Lovely white markings around the neck and the underbelly.

I think this unique pelt adds more charm to this jacket and to the casual fur buyer I don't think it's noticable. This is why I strongly urge furriers to buy mutation fox skins, even if the pelt doesn't perfectly match it is still going to look incredible on the finished garment.

[blackbackedjackal]

Albino Southern Black-backed jackal (L. m. mesomelas) by dougmacsafaris

[canisoccidentalis]

@fyanimaldiversity

Colombia confirmed the first case of an albino ocelot, after carrying out genetic tests on a feline with white fur and red eyes. 

The ocelot was found as a kitten, weighing just 440 grams, in the rural zone of Amalfi and was first thought to be a puma jaguarundi.

Medellin’s Conservation Park undertook genetic testing on the animal, concluding it was actually a leopardus pardalis, a native species of ocelot that is found all across the Americas.

[floweypilled]

Growing in the empty space where a Soul should be

[nobleriver]

The Doctor and River Song + Being A Besotted Old Married Couple

I’m all yours, Sweetie.  Only River Song gets to call me that.

Bonus:

[canisoccidentalis]

Found this image while going through some old photos. Coyote with some sort of dilute gene? Pretty funky color morph that’s for sure.

Found via taxidermy.net.