The late Pleistocene faunal assemblage from Bat Cave, central Ozarks, Missouri provides an opportunity to assess specific aspects of behavior, ecology, and ontogeny of the extinct peccary Platygonus compressus. All identifiable elements referable to this taxon were catalogued and examined, and a minimum number of individuals of 70 was determined for the sample. The presence of distinct, non-overlapping age groups suggests that P. compressus utilized Bat Cave on a seasonal basis. A predator-prey relationship with Canis dirus, the second most abundant vertebrate from the Bat Cave site, is also described in this study. Damage patterns suggest that the feeding patterns of C. dirus at Bat Cave were consistent with its extant relative, and that these predators would periodically enter the cave to hunt and/or scavenge peccaries. Overall, the fossil material from Bat Cave is virtually unweathered and represents one of the most extensive and well-preserved late Pleistocene faunas from the Ozarks.

It has been hypothesized that dietary differences in bone consumption exist between the extinct Pleistocene dire wolf (Canis dirus) and the modern gray wolf (C. lupus). Here dental microwear texture analysis of the m2 is used to test the hypothesized dietary behavior of C. dirus. If the m2 does distinguish dietary tendencies and dire wolves were heavy bone consumers, then the microwear signals of C. dirus should be similar to extant duraphageous canids. Microwear texture analysis of C. dirus was compared with that of C. lupus, coyote (C. latrans), and African wild dog (Lycaon pictus) to assess the degrees of bone consumption. An overall lack in statistically significant variables suggests little difference between the dietary tendencies between C. dirus and C. lupus. The dire wolf did not closely align with the duraphageous L. pictus, which calls into question the hypothesis of heavy carcass utilization during the Pleistocene.