Chapter 1: Evolutionary relationships and taxonomy of Suidae and Tayassuidae13
pigs from north-eastern Australia are closely related to Asian
wild boar, suggesting a possible unrecorded introduction of wild
boar or cross-bred animals into Australia (Gongora et al. 2004).
In some parts of the world, cross-bred animals involving
wild boar, crosses or non-domestic species have been used for
farming. For example, the hybrid S. papuensis in New Guinea
is derived from S. scrofa vittatus and S. celebensis (Groves 1981;
Oliver & Brisbin 1993). S. celebensis is maintained as a domes-
tic animal in Roti and Savur near Timor (Macdonald 1993).
Genuine European wild boar and crosses between these speci-
mens and domestic pigs have been used for farming in Finland
(Gongora et al. 2003).
Tayassuidae
The peccaries are often mistaken by the lay public for pigs, with
which they share the snout disk, but they are strongly distinct
in many ways. The canines are vertically implanted as in most
mammals. The metatarsals of rays III and IV are fused together
except distally, and there is just a remnant of that for ray V, so
that the lateral false hoofs on the hindfeet are absent. There is a
large gland on the croup, just anterior to the sacral area. The tail
is extremely short, with less than seven vertebrae. The dentition
is exceptionally heavy, with short molars; the face is short, high
and adapted for high load-bearing, and the facial sutures fuse
early in ontogeny. There is no noticeable sexual dimorphism.
There are three distinctive genera.
Tayassu Fischer von Waldheim, 1814
White-lipped peccary. Skull relatively high and narrow; ros-
trum expanded ventrally anterior to infraorbital foramen,
and relatively broad and flat dorsally; no large canine buttress;
zygomatic arch of equal calibre throughout. A single species is
recognized.
Tayassu pecari (Link 1795). Distinguished by its black pel-
age with whitish hair bases and often white tips, and a vary-
ing amount of white around the mouth, extending back under
the jaw. There is a mane along the back. Skull length in both
sexes, across all localities, 269–307 mm. From Central America
(Guatemala, Belize) through South America south to Paraguay.
There is geographic variation in this huge area, but it seems
inconsistent and poorly characterized.
Pecari Reichenbach, 1835
Collared peccary. Skull relatively low and wide; rostrum strongly
excavated anterior to infraorbital foramen, and narrow, convex
dorsally; a large canine buttress; zygomatic arch becoming thin-
ner posteriorly. Rather smaller than the white-lipped peccary,
with agouti-banded hairs; the light hairs are aligned round the
neck to form a light collar. There is no dorsal mane.
There have been constant suggestions that there is more than
one single species of collared peccary. Early morphological stud-
ies showed cranial and dental variation among P. tajacu from
throughout the Americas (Woodburne 1968), but specimens
were ultimately grouped into a single species named Dicotyles
tajacu. Kiltie (1985) observed significant cranio-mandibular
differences between desert and rainforest collared peccaries
(P. tajacu) from North and Central/South America, respectively,
but did not attempt to correlate them with specific or subspecific
classification. Other sources of evidence including conventional
cytogenetic (Vassart et al. 1994; Gongora et al. 2000; Builes
et al. 2004) and cross-species chromosome painting studies
(Bosma et al. 2004; Adega et al. 2006), which show differences
in the structure of two chromosomes between specimens from
Arizona, Colombia and Brazil, suggest possible interspecific
variation between collared peccaries from North and South/
Central America.
More recently, an unpublished work by Sánchez et al. (2009)
provided preliminary evidence of differences in three cranial
measurements between P. tajacu from north and central regions
of Colombia. Mitochondrial and nuclear DNA sequence anal-
yses of captive and wild specimens from Argentina, Bolivia,
Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, and the USA confirmed this and
revealed that the geographically widespread and phenotypically
diverse P. tajacu may consist of at least two separate lineages
deserving specific status – perhaps even genetically as distinct as
T. p e c a r i is from C. wagneri – which meet or co-occur in Colombia
(Figure 1.12A,B; Gongora et al. 2006, 2011b). An unpublished
thesis (Sabogal 2011) has provided further DNA insights as to
the presence of these clades in P. tajacu from seven provinces
in Colombia. Definitive morphological evidence comes from
the cranio-mandibular data of Groves and Grubb (2011),Figure 1.12 Collared peccaries from Colombia (A, top, Santa Cruz Zoo;
B, below, Matecaña Zoo). Photos by Jaime Gongora..00312:27:47