The San Diego Zoo Murals – Part Twenty Four

Continuing on, the golden eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) and the merlin (Falco colunbarius) were finished like this:

A common visitor to my porch, the little (in comparison to the Columbia mammoth) scrub jay (Aphelocoma coerulescens) has been completed:

Here’s Merriam’s teratorn (Teratornis merriami) with the gopher snake (Pituophis catenifer) it has killed.

These massive birds of prey were larger than condors.

I roughed in the western meadowlark (Sturnella neglecta), as well as the…

…western horse and foal (Equus occidentalis) and their pursuer, the gigantic American cheetah (Miracinonyx inexpectatus). I used the recessive throwback pattern of the king coat cheetah to inform the patterns I applied to this giant cheetah.

As you can see, the next day I refined the ancient bison (Bison antiquus), the western horses and the American cheetah. The bison may still be too loose, although they look great from a distance.

The western camels (Camelops hesternus) were improved, too. You might be able to tell I did a little more work on the meadowlark.

Very subtle changes here; after more careful research I lowered the line of the top back half of the American mastodon (Mammut americanum) and sloped it down some from spine to tail. I plan to put some sun dappling on its back. I also better defined the grizzly bear‘s (Ursus arctos) snout, ears and shoulders.

These saber-toothed cats (Smilodon californicus) were painted as my light was dying. The one on the left came out just fine, but I see that working in the near dark messed with my values (dark & light systems) sensibilities in the other one. I’ll fix it today.

The critters in this pic are almost finished! The landscape with its requisite California native plant species will hastily follow.