Study shows that dire wolves were a distinct species -- quite different from gray wolves. But somehow, they reached an evolutionary dead end.

Dire Wolves are Real

Dire wolves have always been the stuff of fantasy as it was recently made famous by the series Game of Thrones. But scientists reveal that dire wolves were real once upon a time.

The prehistoric dire wolf prowled through most of America most notably in Los Angeles over 11 millennia ago.

A study published in the journal Nature, led by researchers from the University of California Los Angeles, reports that dire wolves are, in fact, distinct from their previously thought relatives -- the gray wolf.

Dire wolves are considered as one of the most widespread and common large carnivores in the Pleistocene era. However, relatively little information is known about their evolutionary history.

By sequencing five genomes from sub-fossil remains from 13,000 to 50,000 years ago, scientists uncover the truth behind dire wolves.

Despite the morphological similarities between grey wolves and dire wolves, the latter diverged from the living canids 5.7 million years ago.

Unfortunately, in spite of hybridization across Canidae, there is no scientific evidence showing gene flow between the two species.

This shows us that dire wolves evolve in isolation from their Pleistocene ancestors.

Study Puts to Rest Age-Old Mystery

"A legendary symbol of Los Angeles and the La Brea Tar Pits, (dire wolves) has earned its place among unique species that went extinct at the end of the Pleistocene epoch," says Robert Wayne, a distinguished UCLA professor of ecology.

A collaboration of 49 researchers from nine countries, including the US, Australia, the UK, and Germany, published their findings that unlike other canid species that repeatedly migrated between Eurasia and North America, dire wolves evolved only in North America for millions of years.

Despite the overlap between grey wolves, coyotes, and dire wolves as recent as 10,000 years ago, there is no interbred evidence. This means dire wolves were likely to be ill-equipped to adapt to the drastic climatic changes during the end of the ice age.

Dr. Angela Perri from Durham University says, "Dire wolves have always been an iconic representation of the last ice age in the Americas. But what we know about their evolutionary history has been limited to what we can see from the size and shape of their bones and teeth."

The dire wolf or Aenocyon is a mythologized carnivore. Known for their exceptional size, specialized bone-cracking back teeth, and the propensity of preying on larger herbivores, they have earned a reputation as one of the largest most notable predators in the Americas.

Despite their reputation, their demise has been theorized to be due to other dog-like species that out-compared dire wolves or spread diseases.

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