Morphology and Morphometry of Skulls of Raccoon Dogs, Nyctereutes procyonoides and Badgers, Meles meles

Abstract

In order to obtain the basic data to identify the skeletal remains from the archaeological sites, morphological and morphometrical studies were carried out on skulls of living raccoon dogs (35 males and 45 females) and badgers (16 males and 8 females) from Kagoshima Prefecture. Macroscopically, the sexual differences were observed in badgers for the parts of the zygomatic process of the temporal bone and the occipital squama, but were not in raccoon dogs. Among 24 cranial measurements, significant sexual differences were found in five measurement items in raccoon dogs, while 12 items in badgers. Mandibles showed significant sexual differences in both species. Raccoon dogs had significantly larger values than badgers in most of the items concerning length of cranium and most mandibular measurements. The discrimination efficiencies of discriminant formulae between both sexes were lower in raccoon dogs, but higher in badgers, and the efficiencies between both species were obtained 100%. In the regression formulae for estimating skull length, some formulae showed high coefficients of determination in both species. These observations represented interspecific and sexual differences in the skulls of raccoon dogs and badgers.