A biological oddity hiding in plain sight
The chowsingha stands barely 55 to 65 cm at the shoulder and weighs less than 25 kg. It looks, at first glance, like a small, unremarkable deer. Then you count the horns. The front pair sits just above the eyes, rarely growing beyond 4 cm. The rear pair, positioned further back on the skull, can reach 10 to 12 cm. No other mammal on the planet carries this arrangement. Among all living bovids, the family that includes cattle, sheep, goats, and every other antelope, the four-horned antelope, Tetracerus quadricornis, stands alone. The species name says it plainly: tetra for four, cerus for horn. Only males carry the horns. Females are hornless, and even among males, the front horns are sometimes absent or reduced to small bumps, which means a chowsingha without visible front horns is still a chowsingha.
