Domínguez-Rodrigo, ManuelEgeland, Charles P.Cobo-Sánchez, LucíaBaquedano, EnriqueHulbert, Richard C.2022-05-252022-05-252022Domínguez-Rodrigo, Manuel, Egeland, Charles P., Cobo-Sánchez, Lucía, et al.. "Sabertooth carcass consumption behavior and the dynamics of Pleistocene large carnivoran guilds." <i>Scientific Reports,</i> 12, (2022) Springer Nature: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-09480-7.https://hdl.handle.net/1911/112424Apex predators play an important role in the top-down regulation of ecological communities. Their hunting and feeding behaviors influence, respectively, prey demography and the availability of resources to other consumers. Among the most iconic—and enigmatic—terrestrial predators of the late Cenozoic are the Machairodontinae, a diverse group of big cats whose hypertrophied upper canines have earned them the moniker “sabertooths.” Many aspects of these animals’ paleobiology, especially their prey preferences and carcass consumption behavior, remain unsettled. While skeletal anatomy, dental morphology and wear, and isotopic profiles provide important insights, the most direct way to resolve these issues is through the fossil remains of sabertooth prey. Here, we report on a taphonomic analysis of an early Pleistocene faunal assemblage from Haile 21A (Florida, USA) that preserves feeding damage from the lion-sized sabertooth Xenosmilus hodsonae. Patterns of tooth-marking and bone damage indicate that Xenosmilus fully defleshed the carcasses of their prey and even engaged in some minor bone consumption. This has important implications for Pleistocene carnivoran guild dynamics, including the carcass foraging behavior of the first stone-tool-using hominins.engThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.Journal articles41598-022-09480-7https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-09480-7