Meat-Eating Pandas? Ancient Fossils Reveal Europe’s Carnivorous Bears
Newly discovered fossils in Germany unveil an ancient species of panda that once roamed Europe—and they ate more than just plants.
Researchers from Hamburg, Frankfurt, Madrid, and Valencia identified fossilized teeth belonging to Kretzoiarctos beatrix, an ancestor of modern giant pandas. These findings suggest that early pandas were omnivores, consuming both meat and plants.
Modern pandas are known for their bamboo-heavy diet, despite having the digestive system of a carnivore.
This dietary specialization makes them one of the most herbivorous species in the Carnivora order. However, K. beatrix, which lived around 11 million years ago, had a much broader diet, akin to that of modern brown bears.
The fossilized remains, discovered at the Hammerschmiede site in southern Germany, mark the oldest known relative of the giant panda. While K. beatrix was smaller than today’s pandas, it still weighed over 100 kilograms (220 pounds).
The research team compared the teeth of K. beatrix to those of various bear species, including modern pandas, polar bears, and brown bears. Their analysis which was published in Papers in Paleontology revealed that K. beatrix did not specialize in hard plants like its descendants, but instead had a mixed diet.
Professor Madelaine Böhme from the Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment explained that these results shed new light on bear evolution, showing that the panda’s diet only became highly specialized later in its history.
The study, based on macro- and micromorphological analysis, found that K. beatrix’s teeth were suited for chewing a variety of foods, and microscopic scratches suggested it consumed harder materials like bones.
The discovery adds to the incredible biodiversity found at the Hammerschmiede site, where researchers previously uncovered the remains of Danuvius guggenmosi, an ancient great ape that may have walked upright.
The fossil site has yielded over 160 species, including predators like saber-toothed tigers and hyenas, as well as smaller carnivores and omnivores, such as the ancient panda.
This find rewrites part of panda history, revealing that their ancestors once had a far more varied diet, including meat—a stark contrast to today’s bamboo-eating pandas.
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