List of Extinct Mammals in the Philippines
Common Name
|
Description
|
Elephant species | Prehistoric: Found in Iloilo, Panay Island |
Asian elephant | Introduced in the 13th-16th? century from Sabah in the reign of the Sultanate of Sulu, and became extinct on Maguindanao or were transported back to Sabah. Bone fragments were the only proof left behind. |
Stegodon | Once roamed in the plains of Luzon, Mindanao and entire Philippine Archipelago. Unfavorable geographical conditions and human intervention caused their extinction. |
Palawan fossil Sirenia | Lived during the Miocene. Discovered in Palawan in 2011. The fossil hasn't yet been extracted from the rocks in fear of destroying the natural heritage caves of Palawan. Future technology in fossil extraction is the only way to get and identify the fossil. |
Fossil batomys | Lived during the Pleistocene. Excavations in Callao Cave, in the lowland (c. 85 m elevation) Cagayan River Valley of northeastern Luzon, Philippines, have produced the first fossils of any endemic genera of Philippine murid rodents. Three dentaries dated to the Late Pleistocene, between c. 50,000 and 68,000 BP, are referred to the genera Batomys and Apomys. |
Tiger | Extinct in Philippines in Palawan Island (Holocene to Pleistocene) Note: The subspecies of the tiger bones found in Palawan is unsure, though it is closer to the Sumatran tiger. They became extinct n Palawan when a small group of them became trapped when the gap widened as a result of sea levels. They became extinct due to a combination of diminished prey, loss of habitat and possibly overhunting. |
Philippine rhinoceros | Due to the lack of a complete skeleton, little is known about Rhinoceros philippinensis, other than that it lived during the Pleistocene era (2.588 million – 11,700 years ago) and that it was essentially the larger version of its modern cousin, the Sumatran rhino. Fossilized upper jaw. The specimen is a portion of right upper jaw with two well-preserved molars and a broken one of a rhinoceros. |
Cebu warty pig | The Cebu warty pig previously lived in Cebu, Philippines before becoming extinct in modern times, primarily due to habitat destruction. This pig was assessed to be extinct in 2000. |
Palawan Cervus | Extinct since Pleistocene, found in Mainland Palawan |
Cebu dwarf buffalo | Lived during the Pleistocene. The Cebu tamaraw (Bubalus cebuensis) is a fossil dwarf buffalo discovered in the Philippines, and first described in 2006. B. cebuensis would have stood only 75 cm (about 2 ft 6 in) and weighed about 150 to 160 kg (around 300 lbs). |
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