Bears of the Pleistocene

[brotherbear]

BEARS of the last frontier by Chris Morgan... The grandeur of the landscape in the Denali region seems matched by the impressive array of mammals. During the peak of the last glacial period, so much of the earth's seawater was locked up in ice that the Bering Land Bridge was exposed, providing a grassland corridor to North America. A curious exchange of species occured between the two continents over thousands of years and led to a 'Who's Who' of fascinating mammals from the past and present. From North America traveled horses and camels, which were to become the donkeys, zebras, and dromedaries of the Asia we know today. And from Asia came caribou, foxes, ground squirrels, wolves, Dall sheep, beaver, and of course, grizzly bears. 
At this time, around 12,000 years ago, these species utilized the Alaskan ice age refugium, an ice-free region of interior Alaska that provided lush vegetation for grazers and, as a result, plenty of prey for carnivores. Other species found here included the ground sloth, saber-toothed cat, woolly mammoth, giant short-faced bear, and the large-horned bison.   Reply