Male bardelot.
Female bardelot.
The bardelot, Smilomys atrox, is a large, migratory, tundra-dwelling predator rat from the Northern Hemisphere tundra. It is the only real enemy of the woolly gigantelope, and is a creature that would have been very much at home back in the first half of the Last Glacial Period.
With the advent of the gigantelopes, the sabre tooth pattern in predatory mammals has reappeared, but this time among the predator rats. The bardelot, unlike other members of the group, exhibits sexual dimorphism in that only the female is equipped with sabre teeth (as well as a bony pouch for them, similar to Thylacosmilus, but not entirely) and hunts the woolly gigantelopes. The male, having none, resembles more the polar bears that once inhabited this altitude, and hunts the seal-like pytheron rats. Bardelots are about 8 feet (2.4 meters) long and 3¼ feet (1 meter) high at the shoulders. Males have a mass of about 1,100 pounds (499 kilograms); females, about 860 pounds (390 kilograms).
The female's sabers are formed from the outer crowns of her two front teeth (a pattern derived from that of a typical predator rat).
Pouch for saber teeth.