Animals with natural biological harpoons, any particular edge which they would have over other predators?

So I was thinking of a land animal with a biological harpoon, I'm not 100% sure why it would evolve with it.

Details of it would be:

• Quadrupedal
• Medium-sized (similar to a pony) and would hunt smaller or equal sized prey
• not limited to being carnivorous, could be omnivorous
• Harpoon isn't one time use, will be retracted to be used again

The closest I can think of is the cone snail which uses toxin and a harpoon appendage to catch prey due to it being really slow.

The creature I was thinking off wouldn't be THAT slow and if having such a harpoon would have any place in its biology.

We don't see harpoons on land animals for a reason unless I'm missing something, perhaps an insect has it but I'm not 100% sure.

Question: how would a harpoon be a better hunting tool for a land creature than other things we see like claws and limbs for grasping?

posted almost 7 years ago

Matthew Ng‭

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