Four-horned antelope

The four-horned antelope (Tetracerus quadricornis) is a bovine even-toed ungulate. It is also called by its Hindi name chousingha. It is different from other bovines because it has four horns instead of two.

Four-horned antelope are about 0.60 meters high, and they weigh about 20 kilograms. They have a light yellowish-brown fur with a white underside. They have a black stripe down their forelegs. Males have four horns. The back horns are about 10 centimeters long, and the front horns are up to 4 centimeters long.

Four-horned antelope live in India and Nepal. They live in forests. Four-horned antelopes live alone. They eat grass.

Four-horned antelope are hunted by trophy-hunters because of their four horns, but they are also hunted for their meat. Because of the hunting and also because of habitat loss, there are now fewer than 10,000 four-horned antelopes.

Today, four-horned antelope do not live in Africa, but their ancestors probably did.Pilgrim G.E. 1939. The fossil Bovidae of India. Memoirs of the Geological Survey of India, New Series. 26: 1–356.Solounias N. 1990. A new hypothesis uniting Boselaphus and Tetracerus with the Miocene Boselaphini (Mammalia, Bovidae) based on horn morphology. Annales Musei Goulandris. 8: 425–39.

 References 

Category:Bovines
Category:Mammals of Asia