570 vanished lives

299Cenozoic

Thick hide reinforced by tiny bony nodules protected this large ground sloth.

300Cenozoic

Huge curved claws belonged to a forest browser whose name is tied to Thomas Jefferson.

341Cenozoic

Deep jaws and slicing teeth suggest an ancient kangaroo relative that ate meat.

342Cenozoic

A bear-like carnivore used powerful jaws to pry and crush shellfish.

343Cenozoic

Long limbs converged on cheetah proportions, but its closest ties were to cougars.

344Cenozoic

Grasping feet and flexible shoulders reveal a large climbing marsupial.

345Recently extinct

Island scarcity shrank a giant-elephant lineage to about one meter at the shoulder.

346Recently extinct

It was hunted out for fur before scientists could describe a living animal.

347Recently extinct

Its blue cast likely came from gray hair over dark skin rather than bright fur.

348Recently extinct

Broad multi-tined antlers formed a crown above floodplain grasslands.

465Cenozoic

Megalocnus rodens was a large Cuban ground sloth that survived into the Holocene.

466Cenozoic

A mobile snout, huge claws and strange forelimbs belonged to a marsupial unlike any tapir.

467Cenozoic

A cow-sized wombat relative carried a broad snout and heavy limbs.

468Cenozoic

Three pairs of skull bosses and long canines crowned a rhino-sized herbivore.

469Cenozoic

A short face, tusk-like canines and grinding cheeks marked a herd-forming artiodactyl relative.

470Cenozoic

Massive jaws and rounded carnassials crushed bone, though it was not a modern hyena.

471Cenozoic

Huge cutting teeth came from a hyaenodont predator heavier than a modern lion.

472Cenozoic

A flexible proboscidean crossed many habitats and ate mixed vegetation.

498Cenozoic

This fox-sized perissodactyl was a palaeothere relative, not a direct horse ancestor.

499Cenozoic

Short legs, a broad body and high-set eyes adapted a hornless rhinoceros relative to semiaquatic life.

500Cenozoic

Palmate branching antlers made this East Asian giant deer especially conspicuous.

545Cenozoic

Five-toed feet and generalized teeth record an early radiation of hoofed-mammal relatives.

546Cenozoic

A short trunk and upper and lower tusks mark an early stage of proboscidean evolution.

547Cenozoic

A bear-sized heavy body and five-toed feet belonged to a pantodont herbivore.