THE CHEETAH
(Acinonyx jubatis)
Evolution
This animal originated about 4 million years ago, long. The oldest fossils place it in North America in what is now Texas, Nevada and Wyoming. It was common throughout Asia, Africa, Europe and North America until about 10,000 years ago. At the end of the last Ice Age, the earth underwent a massive climatic change and, over a period of years, a large number of mammals disappeared. All cheetah in North America and Europe and most of those in Asia and Africa vanished. It is thought that present populations were derived from inbreeding by those very few surviving and closely related animals. This "bottleneck", as theorized, led to the present state of cheetah genetics: every cheetah alive today appears to be as closely related, genetically, as identical twins.
Description
The sleek cheetah has many adaptations that help make it the world's fastest land animal. It has a lean body, with a small head and long legs. Its non-retractable claws give it a strong grip on the ground. Its body is about four feet long, not including its tail, which can reach three feet. It stands over three feet tall at the shoulder and weighs 75 to 125 pounds. The cheetah's top speed ranges from 55 to 70 miles per hour, but only for a maximum of 400 yards.
Appearance
In Hindi "Cheetah" means "spotted one". The adult fur is yellow or tan with solid black spots over nearly the entire body. The throat is white and the end of the tail is ringed several times in black and tipped with white. The head is proportionally small with eyes set high and a black "tear mark" running from the inner aspect of each eye down to the mouth. The teeth are small and, unlike most cats, there is no gap between the canines and premolars. An adult cheetah, weighing 110-130 pounds (50-59 kilograms), is about 32 inches (81 centimetres) tall at the shoulder and approximately 56 inches (142 centimetres) long with another 30-32 inches (76-81 centimetres) in tail.
