New breed of marsupial painted by artist
A new species of small marsupial has been confirmed to have swaggered around Australia`s mainland in the heyday of ancient times with some of the other bigger beasts.
The tiny pouched lion, known as Lekaneleo, is about the size of the current house cat, whose fossil was discovered 23 years ago at the site of a World Heritage Site in Riversleigh, Kuns state.
The host of The British Broadcasting Corporation`s famous television program, Man and Nature, and Animal World, David of the World`s Natural Documentary Sir David Attenborough once visited the fossil site.
The new marsupial species was previously included in the family Thylacoleonidae because of its smaller size because of its teeth - which have three premolars and four molars.
Anna, three academics at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Anna Gillespie Mike Michael Archer and Susan A study written by Suzanne Hand, the author of the study, details why it was reclassified as one of the "very exciting families ".
Dr Archer said the cat was part of a "strange" family of marsupials.
He said:" This little guy, we call it Lekaneleo roskellyae... One of the smallest bags of lions we`ve ever seen. Actually, it`s the size of a cat. "
In mainland, australia, at least for the last 30 million years of australian history, marsupials are exclusive predators.
"And the new species we`ve just come to know is very different from any other species we`ve seen before, which is why it`s now being described as a new genus of the marsupial. "
In addition to Lekaneleo, there are other bag lion species found at the site of the Riversleigh fossil, along with David The Microleo Attenboroughi marsupial named by Sir Attenborough, about the size of the black leopard, the Wakaleo schouteni marsupial and the larger Thylacoleonids marsupial.
Dr Archer said all the bag lions found at the Riversleigh fossil site had the same impressive premolars.
"They have an unusual, elongated, meat-cutting premolar," he said. "
"This is the most unusual adaptation or evolution developed by carnivorous mammals anywhere in the world.
"It can cut the bones into thin slices. "
"So although it`s the size of an ordinary house cat, don`t think of it as an animal that will be meekly on the couch. "
