Research overview: geographic range of Panthera atrox in Ice Age North America

This overview surveys the distribution of the American lion across Pleistocene North America, where its fossils are known largely from areas south of the great continental ice sheets, extending into parts of Mexico and possibly farther south. Its range appears to have been distinct from that of the cave lion, which dominated Beringia and Eurasia, raising questions about how the two lineages divided the continent and whether the ice sheets and habitat barriers kept them separate. The survey reviews the key localities yielding atrox remains, including Rancho La Brea and various cave and open-air sites, and what the pattern of occurrences reveals about the cat's preferred habitats, its biogeographic origins from cave-lion ancestors, and its ecological role across the Ice Age American landscape.