The presence of large diversity of animals is something that adds additional beauty to mother Earth. Having many unique features, each of these animals do survive in different habitat under different temporal and climatic conditions. world’s largest deer species
This is due to this reason, learning about them becomes more fascinating to researchers and normal individuals. Under a large range of fauna, deer have been an all-time favorite animal, widely known for their innocent face and super active body.
But did you know that the largest deer species had also existed on earth? Even if it is extinct in the modern arena, learning about it would enhance our knowledge of the innocent species. Let us go through the article to learn about the Irish elk.
About the Irish elk.
Megaloceros giganteus or the Irish elk is the giant deer species. This species belonging to the genus Megaloceros has become extinct for a century.
The Irish elk has been known for its huge and unique body structure, which was uncommon for the deer species to attain. They were mainly known to have lived across Eurasia during the Pleistocene, spanning through Ireland to Lake Baikal in Siberia.
However, most of their dead remains have been excavated using the process of carbon dating to nearly 7,700 years ago in western regions of Russia. Some of the important facts regarding their existence are mentioned as follows:
- The large skeletal remains of Irish elk have been collected from the bogs in Ireland. Hence, for many of the researchers, it has been one of the important habitats of the Irish elks.
- Their giant structure was the main entity that attracted the researchers to study more about their dead remains.
- Some of them were carnivores whereas some were revealed to be herbivores depending on the availability of food in their surroundings.
Nomenclature.
The Irish elk were not closely related to any of the species considered under the name elk i.e, for Alces alces (the European elk, recognized in North America as the moose) or Cervus Canadensis (the North American elk or wapiti). It is due to this reason some publications termed it as “giant deer” instead of the Irish elk. world’s largest deer species
As per some historical sources, the Irish elk has close relations with that of red deer. Bt after an empirical analysis, it was revealed that the Irish deer has the closest association with the fallow dear.
Physical appearance.
Since the Irish elk are famous for their huge body structure, let us discuss a little about their physical appearance.
- This unique deer species had an average height of nearly 2.1 meters (6 ft 11 in) up to their shoulders.
- They carried the largest antlers of any known deer species.
- Their body size ranged from 450-700 kilograms or even more in some cases.
- The Irish elk is considered to have a more robust skeleton than any other similar organism existing in that period.
As per Valerius Geist (a Canadian biologist ), the Irish elk had a cursorial attribute. This means that they were adapted for running and staminal activities. He considered them to have nearly the same characteristics as that of a reindeer.
