508 AFRICAN GAME ANIMALS 



No flesh measurements of specimens are available. The 

 race is smaller somewhat than the highland form, the skull 

 measuring only 14 inches in length. Horns average 23 

 inches in length. 



The Kobs 



Adenota 



Adenota Gray, 1850, Proc. Zool. Soc, p. 129; type Kobus kob. 



The kobs are easily distinguishable from the reedbucks 

 and waterbucks by the peculiar S-shaped curve assumed 

 by the horns. The horns near the base are bowed back- 

 ward, but the tips are recurved forward and inward giving 

 them the shape of an elongated "S" when viewed from 

 the side. The back of the pasterns and the border of the 

 hoofs are well haired as in the waterbuck. The tail is short, 

 usually less than fourteen inches in length, and does not 

 reach the hocks. The tip has a distinct tuft of long hair. 

 All of the races, with the exception of the white-eared, are a 

 uniform tawny-yellow color on the dorsal surface without 

 any very bold markings, with the exception of the black 

 leg stripes present in most races. The nearest allies of the 

 kobs are the lechwis, which have somewhat similarly shaped 

 horns, but differ decidedly by having the whole posterior 

 surface of the pasterns and a narrow border surrounding the 

 hoofs and false hoofs bare or hairless. The tail is also much 

 longer, usually reaching to the hocks, and bearing at the tips 

 a distinct tuft of long hair. The length of this member aver- 

 ages four inches longer than in the kobs. The horn length 

 is considerably greater in the lechwi, in which the horns are 

 wider-spread, sublyrate, and less S-shaped. The skull is 

 distinctly longer-snouted in the kobs, and is without the 

 prominent swelling in the supraorbital region which is char- 

 acteristic of the lechwi. The genus includes two species, 

 vardoni, of the Zambesi region, which lacks the black leg 

 stripes, and kob, of the equatorial region. 



The kobs range from the Zambesi watershed northward 

 through the central lake drainage area to the Nile Valley; 

 east to British East Africa, and westward through Nigeria 

 to Senegal. 



