''Ectopocynus'' ("strange dog") is an extinct genus of bone crushing

canid Canidae (; from Latin, '' canis'', " dog") is a biological family of dog-like carnivorans, colloquially referred to as dogs, and constitutes a clade. A member of this family is also called a canid (). There are three subfamilies found withi ...

which inhabited North America from the Oligocene to the Early

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and mea ...

. It lived from 33.3 to 16.0 Ma and existed for approximately .Paleobiology Database: ''Ectopocynus''
/ref> Remains of ''Ectopocynus'' are limited to

mandible In anatomy, the mandible, lower jaw or jawbone is the largest, strongest and lowest bone in the human facial skeleton. It forms the lower jaw and holds the lower teeth in place. The mandible sits beneath the maxilla. It is the only movable bone ...

s and teeth only. These reveal that the animal had simple, robust, and blunt yet massive premolars and reduced or lost

cusp A cusp is the most pointed end of a curve. It often refers to cusp (anatomy), a pointed structure on a tooth. Cusp or CUSP may also refer to: Mathematics * Cusp (singularity), a singular point of a curve * Cusp catastrophe, a branch of bifurc ...

s on the lower molars. In this respect, ''Ectopocynus'' had many of the characteristics of '' Enhydrocyon''. This dentition suggests this animal was a

hypercarnivore A hypercarnivore is an animal which has a diet that is more than 70% meat, either via active predation or by scavenging. The remaining non-meat diet may consist of non-animal foods such as fungi, fruits or other plant material. Some extant exam ...

mesocarnivore A mesocarnivore is an animal whose diet consists of 50–70% meat with the balance consisting of non-vertebrate foods which may include insects, fungi, fruits, other plant material and any food that is available to them. Mesocarnivores are from a ...

References

*Wang, X. 1994
Phylogenetic systematics of the Hesperocyoninae (Carnivora, Canidae)
Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 221:1-207. Hesperocyonines Oligocene carnivorans Burdigalian extinctions Miocene carnivorans Oligocene mammals of North America Prehistoric carnivoran genera Rupelian genus first appearances {{canid-stub