I Love Finding Canines

[Shellseeker]

I found this tooth Monday --- and a canine always makes my searches worthwhile. I noted that the root was brownish rather than the typical black from the Peace River and I also wondered if it was modern or fossilized.

With the tooth "sharpened" on an opposing canine, I realized this was peccary, tapir, OR modern wild boar. SO could it be a wild boar canine? -- After a search actually not -- Peccary and Wild Boar have similar tusks (Canines), which look very little like Tapir Canines.. This is Tapir so a minimum of 11000 years. The Tapir from Florida was not a currently existing family member, but either the extinct Tapirus veroensis or Tapirus haysii.

Maybe someone will have an answer -- Does the sharpened edge identify the position of this specific canine?

[jcbshark]

Sorry no answer but nice find Jack.

[RichW9090]

Yes.

[Shellseeker]

Yes.

Good answer!!!! It makes sense, So if I position this one as lower left, then the sharpened area is toward the center of the mouth. If I am correct that the upper and lower canines directly opposed sharpen each other, then the upper left canine would have a sharpened area on the side away from the center of the mouth.

If there is an article or pdf explaining this please point me to it. Thanks Rich

[Sacha]

That's nice! Can't beat canines as a reward for a day of screening. I got out Tuesday and the finds were OK, but pretty average until I found a pretty decent peccary tusk, which was my first of an adult size. Makes the day a little more worthwhile.

Your Tapir canine is very cool. For some reason Tapir dentition is one of my favorites.