Abstract
Species of Canis (Carnivora, Canidae) have similar morphology and distinguishing sympatric species is challenging. We present data on morphometry of skull, body and hair of three wild Canis species that occur in India, which include two wolves (Indian wolf, Canislupuspallipes; and Himalayan wolf, Canishimalayensis) and the golden jackal (Canisaureus). A total of 20 cranial and six body measurements and microscopic characteristics of guard hair were analysed, using multivariate ordination to differentiate between species. Cranial measures of the Himalayan wolves were found to be the largest followed by Indian wolves and golden jackals. However, many measures overlapped amongst the three species. Two Principal Components each, for body measures and cranial measures, explained 86 and 91% of the variation in the data, respectively. These Components discriminated the two wolves from golden jackals, but could not distinguish between wolves. Hair medullary patterns were simple and wide type, whereas hair cuticular patterns showed crenate scale margins, near scale distance and irregular wavey scale patterns for all Canis taxa and were not useful to distinguish species. Data reported in this study further contribute to the existing global data on wild canids for a holistic understanding of the variation within the genus and show that distinguishing between all sympatric species from morphology alone may not be possible.
Highlights
Three wild Canis species occur in India: the Indian wolf ( Canis lupus pallipes), the Himalayan wolf (Canis himalayensis) and the golden jackal (Canis aureus; Fig. 1)
Based on the variables used in this study, Principal Component Analysis (PCA) showed clear discrimination between skulls of wolves and golden jackals and with an overlap of the 95% ellipses of the two wolves
Except for M2 length, mean values of all other variables were found to be larger in the Himalayan wolf in comparison to the Indian wolf (Table 1)
Summary
Three wild Canis species occur in India: the Indian wolf ( Canis lupus pallipes), the Himalayan wolf (Canis himalayensis) and the golden jackal (Canis aureus; Fig. 1). The range of the golden jackal overlaps the entire range of the Indian wolf, but co-occurrence between golden jackals and Himalayan wolves is extremely rare (Jhala and Moehlman 2004) Another wild canid, the Asiatic wild dog (Cuon alpinus), known as the dhole, is often found in sympatry with all the three Canis species. IUCN lists grey wolves and golden jackals as least concern (Boitani et al 2020, Hoffmann et al 2020) Regionally, both wolves in India are considered endangered and protected under Schedule I of the Indian Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 and Appendix 1 of the Convention on International trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). Cranial (mm) and body (cm) measurements of adult golden jackals (n = 33 skull, 52 body), Indian wolves (n = 12 skull, 11 body) and Himalayan wolves (n = 4 skull, 4 body) from India
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