hypercarnivore
n. An animal with a diet consisting mostly of meat.
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2016
House cats are an absolute ecological nightmare, implicated in the extinction of dozens of species, and posing a grave threat to many more….They’re only follow[ing] their predatory instincts; ultimately the fault is with you. Your love of felines opens the door for these hypercarnivores to invade new environments and catch unsuspecting creatures unaware.
—Jacqueline Ronson, “Cats Are an Ecological Nightmare and Ruining the Environment,” Inverse, October 12, 2016
2015
After analyzing 15,000-year-old fossil records, a group of evolutionary biologists calculated the size of prehistoric carnivores and herbivores and concluded that huge "hypercarnivores" could have hunted massive mammoths, mastodons, and ground sloths — curbing any potential overconsumption of plant life.
2014
Analysis of the fossil indicates it has distinctly “hypercarnivorous” teeth, which means it evolved to be highly predatory rather than a more generalist meat-eater who might also have munched on vegetation… Hypercarnivores — such as polar bears, gray wolves and Arctic foxes — are typical predators in the Arctic, where there are few non-animal food sources, especially during winter.
—Gemma Tarlach, “Arctic Fox and Other Polar Predators May Have Originated In the Himalayas,” Discover, June 10, 2014
1999 (earliest)
In North America, cursorial hypercarnivores were lacking, while such species were present in the European faunas.
—Michael Morlo, “Niche structure and evolution in creodont (Mammalia) faunas of the Eocene of Europe and North America,” Geobios, March 01, 1999