Equus occidentalis
Extinct species of horse
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Equus occidentalis (commonly known as the western horse) is an extinct species of wild horse that once inhabited North America, specifically the Southwestern United States, during the Pleistocene epoch.[1][2][3][4] It was first described from three teeth with insufficient diagnostic characters, one even being suggested to be a separate taxon related to the American Zebra, leading some researchers to consider it a nomen dubium, though this taxonomic debate is yet to be fully resolved.[5][6]
| Equus occidentalis Temporal range: | |
|---|---|
| |
| Skeleton in Carnegie Museum of Natural History | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Perissodactyla |
| Family: | Equidae |
| Genus: | Equus |
| Species: | †E. occidentalis |
| Binomial name | |
| †Equus occidentalis Leidy, 1865 | |
E. occidentalis was about the same size as the modern Arabian horse, measuring up to 1.47 metres (4.8 ft) in shoulder height. It was morphologically and proportionally similar to the modern day zebra.[7]
