New research shows captive big cats have less dense bones than their wild counterparts, likely because of reduced movement.
. The felines’ front legs were most affected; for example, the femurs of captive mountain lions were about four-fifths as dense as those of wild cats, whereas their humeri were only three-fourths as dense.
Chirchir and her colleagues blame a lack of physical activity. But other factors could be involved. “One concern is inbreeding,” Hartstone-Rose says, noting that captive animals have higher levels of inbreeding and that genetic overlap could negatively impact an animal’s skeleton. But the researchers don’t know the family histories of each animal in their study, so there was no way to test that, Chirchir says.
The scientists also don’t know how all the animals in their study died, and whether they were healthy when alive. Reduced bone density can result in brittle bones; the researchers say that, although the bones in the study are not from modern zoos, animals released back to the wild through conservation programs might be at some disadvantage as a result of their captivity.
Those results are relevant to any scientist who uses natural history collections, which often contain captive bones mixed in with wild ones, in their research, says Stephanie Smith, who studies animal morphology at the Field Museum. When comparing captive and wild bones, researchers should ask, “Is that going to mess up my study?” she says. “It’s something we should be paying attention to.”
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