Sri Lankan sambar deer

The Sri Lankan sambar or Indian sambar (Rusa unicolor unicolor) - it is also spelt "sambhur" or "sambur" - ගෝණා (gōṇā) in Sinhala, is a subspecies of the sambar that lives in India and Sri Lanka. This subspecies is one of the largest sambar subspecies, with the largest antlers both in size and in body proportions. Large males weight up to 270–280 kg. Sambar live in both lowland dry forests and mountain forests. Large herds of sambar roam the Horton Plains National Park, where it is the most common large mammal.

Sambar
Stag/male
Doe/female
both in Kanha National Park, Madhya Pradesh, India
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Artiodactyla
Family: Cervidae
Subfamily: Cervinae
Genus: Rusa
Species:
Subspecies:
R. u. unicolor
Trinomial name
Rusa unicolor unicolor
(Kerr, 1792)[1]
Synonyms
  • Cervus unicolor unicolor

British explorers and planters referred to it, erroneously, as an elk,[2] leading to place names such as Elk Plain.

References

  1. Rusa unicolor
  2. Storey, Harry (1907). Hunting & Shooting in Ceylon (PDF). Longmans, Green and Co.
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