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Carnivorous and Omnivores Animals, Excluding Felids
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Bears
Bear Size ~
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Bear Size ~
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Many people ask us for more details about Jimbo.
Jimbo is a Kodiak bear. He weighs almost 1500 lbs and stands 9.5 feet tall. He is 22 years old this month and Susan and Jim have had him since he was a cub. Jimbo originally came from an animal park out west and he had an injury to his back leg. The injury was a permanent one and he still gets stiff in that hind leg when it's cold out. Jimbo was born in captivity at the animal park and was never a "wild bear". That park has since closed. Since he was born in captivity to a mother also born in captivity he would have no skills taught to him to survive in the wild. (Plus his leg injury would have made it even worse for him. ) Jimbo lives with Leo and is closest friends with him. Orphaned Wildlife Center  *This image is copyright of its original author
 (01-18-2016, 09:26 PM)brotherbear Wrote: http://www.bearbiology.com/fileadmin/tpl..._Vol_7.pdf I will add to this that the heaviest grizzly on this study was a 15 year old who weighed 301.9 kg or 665.58 pounds. Remember that this was not a venture to find "the biggest bear" but rather a routine study where the health of the bears and a population size estimate were the main concerns. Size and growth patterns were studied, but this is not in seeking maximum weight of mature bears.  (01-12-2016, 05:28 PM)brotherbear Wrote: Weight Chart: While the largest bear ever weighed was a Kodiak brown bear of over 1002 kg , the polar bear as a species averages more than the brown bear , smaller brown bears in southern Europe, the middle east, and the Himalayas can weigh less than 100 kg whereas their cousins in Kamchatka or Alaska can be over 500 kg.  (01-20-2016, 10:48 PM)Dr Panthera Wrote:(01-12-2016, 05:28 PM)brotherbear Wrote: Weight Chart: I think we should just use wild specimens instead of captive individuals. Captive animals can ruin any wild average sizes due to the random and unusual habits that they receive in their captive environments.
In top weights, captive brown bears can outweigh the biggest polar bears. In the wild, the polar bear is usually the bigger bear with the greater max...
Captive is meaningless, certain animals do better in captivity compared to others.
Especially subject to that is polar bears, no zoo or sanctuary is capable of supplying them the nutrients needed to sustain a real lifestyle. Its not like they are getting a large diet of beluga and walrus etc. compared to an omnivorous bear that can have its diet sustained easier. Also noted is the unpredictability of a polar bear compared to brown bears. Much like the difference between tiger and lion. Which may also be the reason why they don't do as well in captivity, maybe they are more susceptible to depression or stress? The latter of both examples seem to be the more unpredictable animal according to trainers I have read. This isn't a "one is better than the other" remark, just the fact that they can change their attitude at a drop of a hat with no real idea as to why. Lastly is the fact that these bears are usually obese and a far cry from their wild counterparts. Show me a bear like Van and that is the true capabilities of these animals, not a bear like Jimbo.
When I look at the late Bart the Bear, a 1500 pound Kodiak, I am not looking at an obese bear. He just looked big and healthy. Same with Brutus, the 900 pound inland grizzly. In fact, when I look at the few existing pictures of Goliath, he does not appear obese. The framework of brown bears are made by nature to carry his Winter-time fat reserve. Therefore it takes a lot more weight gain to make a grizzly unhealthily fat ( obese ) than say a big cat.
You and I look upon them with different eyes I guess.
Van-  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Bart-  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Bart certainly is an impressive bear, but when I compare him to Van, Van looks much more muscle packed or "dense" if you will. Also bart is photographed from feet away with a human to scale him where Van is probably photographed from 100s of yards away and nothing to scale him against. But I was really talking about Jimbo  *This image is copyright of its original author Who obviously is an overweight bear, but still an impressive creature. Don't get me wrong... But like I said, a omnivorious animal will put on weight much easier than a purely predatory animal especially one that needs a very specific diet. All that being said, its harder to tell with bears, you're correct. But what is true in any other instance, a wild specimen will always be superior to a captive one. The life of a captive bear will never come close to put the physical strain on them compared to their wild counterparts and thus will never be in the same type of shape. But I do think that Barts active lifestyle and his constant training contributed to his better looks than most other captive bears. Like the ones you see in Noahs ark or at the zoo, usually why you see better looking Circus animals compared to Zoo animals.
Being a wild bear who digs and works for his meals is certainly the more muscular bear. However, Bart is no more obese than Van. Jimbo appears to be on the heavy side though not necessarily obese. He has a bad leg therefore probably limited exercise. But I agree that we should be looking at the weights of wild bears.
(01-21-2016, 12:42 AM)Pckts Wrote: Captive is meaningless, certain animals do better in captivity compared to others. I don't think either of those carnivores are more unpredictable or better than the other, but in determining bear sizes, we'll only use wild specimens, not a world record 1000 kg brown bear that is probably obese.
Jimbo is not that obese as you think, animals aren't like certain humans who lived in laziness for over 1000s of years, and Jimbo isn't literally made of fat, as an animal, he's still got plenty of muscle equivalent to that of a 1000 pound brown bear. But that is a rarity, of course. Wild specimens do tend to have more muscle and less fat than captive specimens at equal weights. I agree with brotherbear's assessment that Bart looks no more obese than Van, he just grows his fat slightly differently (more around his hips rather than stomach or chest), and Bart also looks to have thicker and more grizled fur, making him look fatter.
Let's say you are a native grassland, hunter-gatherer type of African. You have to do so much work to sustain yourself just to get the most basic necessity: food. However, we as humans naturally decline in muscular force production, regardless whether we do the same thing for 80 years. By age 80, you would only have about 50% of your muscle left, even though you're doing the same thing for since teen years, just at a less forceful pace. A person who lived for the first twenty years of his life eating junk and staying in the basement would quite literally be a "huge pile of fat" unlike a person living actively.
Not so the case with normally-active animals such as bears, cats, bovines, or large reptiles. Bears and cats in captivity, even given the fattest foods ever with minimal excercise, would still be (not sure about looks, though, for bears) quite muscular for their weight, yet just a tad fatter than if they were in the wild. The reason why they can still be extremely muscular even if given minimal exercise is because the genes are already set for them over millions of years as carnivores to actively hunt food. They wouldn't be total fat slobs compared to a wild version of themselves, unlike us. We simply regulate muscle and fat dufferently. Taking post-prime years and muscle deterioration into account, its safe to say that Jimbo is not entirely fat, just slightly less muscular than Bart or Van. A basement-dwelling man at about 250 pounds, on the other hand, would have at least 40% more more body fat than a 230 pound, 20% bodyfat man who actively plays as a quarterback in football.
@Polar
Louis Roth said "Lions will slap their tail, roar and stomp when they are unhappy. A tiger is impossible to tell, they will attack out of no where. " He also says that polar bears just walk with their heads moving side to side and are impossible to read. They almost look like they are in a daze. ( I couldn't find this page because of time constraints but Ill look tomorrow, I know I read it somewhere) He says that polar bears are the most vicious of all the big animals, able to kill the average lion or tiger with little effort. He estimated his male to be 700lbs after weighing hes cage and all the bears inside then deducting the cage weight. Louis has had Kodiak, grizzlies and Polar bears, grizzlies fight on their back legs and polar bears use their teeth. A polar bears roar puts a lions or tigers to shame All on pages 114-117 in forty years with jungle killers. What I mean about the unpredictability of a tiger compared to a lion... And Hans Brick For one he says that most shows with "ice bears" will be females because the males are just to aggressive and are better for window dressing and he says that bears in general are very clever and possibly the most dangerous of all the beasts. Hans Brick says that Grizzlies are very rarely used in the circus and he has never seen them, they are too dangerous. He also says that other than the Kodiak, the Grizzly is the largest bear he has seen which gives more credence to the fact that Polar bears just don't do well in captivity.
Another point to make is that bears continually get stronger and stronger even past their prime, and in fact, they are one of the only animals to do so. (Hence, mature bears' larger sizes than young bears.) Cats get weaker past their prime years, and start to achieve less muscle force, but NOWHERE near the rate as in even the hardest-working of humans, whom collctively lose 50% of muscle weight at 80, regardless of activities.
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