Indeed. As a matter of fact, some research has suggested that P.tigris and P.uncia share a common ancestor more recently than some subspecies of P.pardus do with one another! Moreover, the split between the tigris/uncia clade and the pardus/leo/onca clade is basal enough that someone who was sad enough at the loss of the genus Uncia would be justified in keeping it and moving tigris into it!
Definitely two seperate species in the same genus. Converse to some posts above, however, they are indeed in the *family* Pantherinae. The belief that they were part of the extinct felid family Machairodontinae - ie the sabertoothed cats such as Smilodon, Dinofelis and Homotherium - is a now-dismissed theory based on the divergent evolution in Neofelis of saber-teeth, albeit ones which are largely invisible when the mouth is closed. One interesting thing to note is that Neofelis is the most basal member of Pantherinae, and Pardofelis is the most basal member of Felinae, and as such they demonstrate strong morphological similarities.
I never knew that Neofelis and Pardofelis were morphologically similar, it makes sense though. The sabertooth theory always struck me as odd, the only evidence being the canines on both families and I'm glad that this has now been dismissed. For some reason I couldn't reply to this thread for about half an hour. A problem I've not encountered before!
I wouldn't normally but as this is quite a pedantic thread already (best kind ), it's perhaps worth noting that Pantherinae, Felinae and Machairodontinae are subfamilies within the family Felidae - which is much more stable - one of the most stable taxonomic units going!
Quite - the only major revision to the definition of Felidae which I can recall was the removal of Nimravidae when it was determined that this family was actually the most basal of all feliforms, along with the Nandiniidae forming a sister group to all other extant feliforms. Ironically, a decade or so after that, Nimravidae was split and the former subfamily Barbourofelidae was raised to full family level and placed as the closest sister group to the Felidae!
Interesting discussing and to put some more " oil on the fire": a study in 2011 from Lei et al. used the whole mitochondrial genome to look for relations within Panthera, originally they took Neofelis as one of the outgroups, but they concluded iy was the most basal member of the Panthera genus. P. uncia seems to be most related to P. leo and are the last split that occured in the genus. The propose a split of Panthera nebulosa with the rest of the Panthera clade of 6.5 mya.
Of course, it is six and two-threes as to whether one classes Neofelis as the most basal member of Panthera or as a seperate genus, as both options are monophyletic. Considering Neofelis encompasses two species, I prefer keeping it as a seperate genus.
Incidentally, in this context, it is interesting to note that the book The Mammals of the Indomalayan Region (G. B. Corbett & J. E. Hill; 1992) removes the clouded leopard from the genus Neofelis and places it alongside the marbled cat in the genus Pardofelis. I realise, of course that this book is now twenty years old and this classification isn’t generally accepted today.
I believe that even the 1999 sixth edition of Walker's Mammals suggested this as a likely re-classification, judging by the edited and updated Walker's Carnivores release I now own. It is a very defensible theory, even though incorrect - as the most basal members of their respective sub-families, Neofelis and Pardofelis will obviously be quite close genetically and morphologically, and by extension can be suggested to bear close resemblance to the last common ancestor of the two groups. Compare and contrast the main image on this page to the following photograph of Pardofelis temminckii tristis.
I'm not familiar with "Walker's Carnivores", but the 1999 (sixth) edition of “Walker's Mammals of the World” lists the clouded leopard as Neofelis nebulosa and the marbled cat as Felis marmorata. The section on marbled cat does state, though, that some authorities consider it closely related to the clouded leopard; while the clouded leopard section comments that Corbett & Hill (1992) place it with the marbled cat in Pardofelis.
