NOW

Descriptive species information is recorded under the following categories: Diet, Locomotion, Size and Teeth. Most data fields in these categories follow the definitions described in the ETE manual, and a good example taxon for this type of information is Histrongotherium grimmi within the NOW database.

Additional instructions for a few categories are listed below:

• 
  Diet 3: used as is, with the recommendation that except for hypothetical, well-founded exceptions, the following should be lumped: soft and hard with mixed; seeds, exudates and fr-se-res with fruit.
• 
  Locomotion 2: use as is, except that semi-fossorial is suppressed (cannot in our opinion be recognised on morphological criteria). We note that small (< 10 kg) "general quadrupeds" (gen_quad) correspond roughly to Peter Andrew's category "semi-arboreal" (small mammals lacking locomotory specialisations for arboreal locomotion but equally able to walk in trees and on the ground).
• 
  Locomotion 3: The value cursorial should be reserved for forms with joints restricted to movement in the anteroposterior plane. More agile ungulates with more laterally mobile limbs should be classified as gen_quad (general quadruped). Remember that goats can climb trees! With increasing size, this category grades into graviportal.
• 
  Body Mass & Length: The ETE database allows any number to be entered as the taxon's mean body mass (in grams). The snout-vent length classes of NOW are:
  • Class 1 = very small (<0.1 m)
  • Class 2 = small (0.1-1 m)
  • Class 3 = medium (1-2 m)
  • Class 4 = large (2-5 m)
  • Class 5 = very large (>5 m)
• 
  Tooth Height: use as is. In doubtful cases select the lower value.