Mustela erminea

The stoat, also known as the Eurasian ermine or ermine, is a species of mustelid native to Eurasia and the northern regions of North America. Because of its wide circumpolar distribution, it is listed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List. The name ermine is used especially in its pure white winter coat of the stoat or its fur. Ermine fur was used in the 15th century by Catholic monarchs, who sometimes used it as the mozzetta cape. It has long been used on the ceremonial robes of members of the United Kingdom House of Lords. It was also used in capes on images such as the Infant Jesus of Prague.

Mustela erminea

Marton Berntsen , crop by User:MPF · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
stoatPBDB
Sits inside
MustelaPBDB
Diet
carnivore, omnivorePBDB, for Mustelidae
Life habit
scansorialPBDB, for Mustelidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Mass
0.22 kgWikidata

Time the record covers

At least 198 thousand years on record.

The record covers at least 210 ka to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 1.4 Mya to 0 Mya.

Pleistocene — about 16 of 17 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 1 of 17 occurrences1.5–1.4 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences1.4–1.3 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences1.3–1.3 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences1.3–1.2 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences1.2–1.1 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences1.1–1.1 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences1.1–1.0 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences1.0–950 ka Mya — about 0.3 occurrences950 ka–887 ka Mya — about 0.3 occurrences887 ka–823 ka Mya — about 0.3 occurrences823 ka–760 ka Mya — about 0.3 occurrences760 ka–697 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences697 ka–633 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences633 ka–570 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences570 ka–507 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences507 ka–443 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences443 ka–380 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences380 ka–317 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences317 ka–253 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences253 ka–190 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences190 ka–127 ka Mya — about 0.7 occurrences127 ka–63 ka Mya — about 5 occurrences63 ka–0 Mya — about 5 occurrences210 ka – 11.7 ka1.9 Mya0 Mya

17 occurrences of Mustela erminea on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

17 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

2 formations

Crooked Creek — 37.20°N, 100.30°WCromer Forest Bed — 52.94°N, 1.25°E

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The named rock units Mustela erminea has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 15 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Mustela erminea and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Mustela erminea and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

546 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 17 sites for Mustela erminea, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

16 references

Each of the 17 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 4 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Mustela erminea

Credit
Marton Berntsen , crop by User:MPF
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Licence
CC Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itMustela through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Linnaeus 1758