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True horns are found mainly among: Ruminant artiodactyls. Antilocapridae ; Bovidae (cattle, goats, antelopes etc.). Giraffidae: Giraffids have a pair of skin covered bony bumps on their heads, called ossicones. Cervidae: Most deer have antlers, which are not true horns due to lacking a bone core and made of keratin.
A pair of horns on a male impala Anatomy of an animal's horn. A horn is a permanent pointed projection on the head of various animals that consists of a covering of keratin and other proteins surrounding a core of live bone. Horns are distinct from antlers, which are not permanent.
Rhinoceros horns, unlike those of other horned mammals, consist only of keratin. These horns rest on the nasal ridge of the animal's skull. Antlers are unique to cervids and found mostly on males: the only cervid females with antlers are caribou and reindeer, whose antlers are normally smaller than males'.
The resulting offspring are usually fertile. A study of these hybrid animals at Spioenkop Dam Nature Reserve in South Africa revealed that many had disadvantageous abnormalities relating to their teeth, horns, and the wormian bones in the skull. [27] Another study reported an increase in the size of the hybrid as compared to either of its parents.
The horns also make the animals a prized game trophy, which has led to the near-extinction of the two northern species. As an introduced species Between 1969 and 1977, the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish in the US intentionally released 95 gemsbok into its state's White Sands Missile Range [ 16 ] and that population is now estimated ...
Males also usually have a single median ossicone on the frontal bone that is larger in northern animals and smaller in southern giraffes. [3] Giraffes can also have small additional paired occipital ossicones on the occipital bones, paired orbital ossicones associated with eyes, and azygous ossicones.
They are found only in the Giraffidae and closely related extinct clades, [4] represented in modern animals by the giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis) and the okapi (Okapia johnstoni). Pronghorns are similar to horns in that they have keratinous sheaths covering permanent bone cores; however, these sheaths are deciduous and can be shed like ...
Excepting some domesticated forms, all male bovids have horns, and in many species, females, too, possess horns. The size and shape of the horns vary greatly, but the basic structure is a pair of simple bony protrusions without branches, often having a spiral, twisted, or fluted form, each covered in a permanent sheath of keratin.