bone-crushing dog

English

Noun

bone-crushing dog (plural bone-crushing dogs)

1. (zoology) Any of a subfamily (Borophaginae) of large extinct canids of North America, noted for powerful teeth and jaws.
   • 1990, National Geographic Research:

     Carnivore damage and age distribution of the bones of the rhinoceros Teleoceras suggest that the bone-crushing dog Osteoborus, or a related carnivore, significantly influenced the accumulation of some of the vertebrate fossils.

   • 2002, Donald R. Prothero, Robert M. Schoch, Associate Professor of Science and Mathematics Robert M Schoch, Horns, Tusks, and Flippers: The Evolution of Hoofed Mammals, JHU Press, →ISBN, page 36:

     He also saw many bone splinters which appeared to have been worked by humans. (We now know that they were fractured by an extinct family of bone-crushing dogs)

   • 2010, Rex Buchanan, Kansas Geology: An Introduction to Landscapes, Rocks, Minerals, and Fossils, University Press of Kansas, page 150:

     Bone-crushing dogs, which are only distantly related to living wolves and coyotes, possessed heavy skulls and jaws and large, broad teeth.