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Bears
Bear Strength
Bear Strength
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Bear Strength
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Bears (regardless of species) are capable of incredibly amazing feats of strength and power that no human is capable of even replicating; even a small bear fits under this rule. They are similar to felines in this regard, as well.
From my sight-seeings and research about all types of bears, I've come up with several conclusions: -Bears have the most developed scapula and deltoid arrangement of any carnivore, resulting in the "shoulder hump" phenomena in comparison to big cats (especially brown bears and Agriotherium.) -Despite what people say about big cat power, bears can be just as explosive as big cats at equal weights. What do you guys think? 
I think it's relative.
What do you mean by "explosive?" Is it excelerating to the fastest speed on land? Leaping over a fence or high wall in a single bound? Climbing a tree while holding carrying something larger than it self? Because a cat is unmatched there... Or do you mean running at full speed for long distances? Grappling and shoving with extreme force? Sustained power? Overturning heavy rocks and digging? Then a bear is unmatched there. But when I think of "explosive power" I see no animal on land that comes close to a cat but that isn't a slight against bears, that's what cats are built for. Quick explosive actions of pure violence while a bear is built for a long battle where the stronger one reigns supreme. If you wanted an example I would look into which has more quick twitch muscle fibers, to my knowledge, the big cat is almost unmatched in this example but that's what I mean by "relative." There are too many ways to interpret "explosive." 
by Blaire Van Valkenburgh - First posted by grraahh - http://shaggygod.proboards.com/
SPEED AND STRENGTH All bears have a large head with small ears followed by massive shoulders and a short back and | tail, all of which are supported on thick limbs and broad paws. Compared with big cats, bears have longer snouts and shorter, stiffer backs. Relative to large dogs, bears have bulky legs and much more spreading feet. Unlike these other carnivores, and more like humans, bears walk on the soles of their hindfeet, with their ankle joint positioned just above the ground. This condition is called plantigrade, and differs from the digitigrade posture of cats and dogs, in which the “soles” of the feet are elevated, along with the ankle, and only the toes touch the ground. To understand why bears are built so differendy from cats and dogs, it is essential to explain the benefits of digitigrade feet. Running around on your toes in a digitigrade posture is advantageous if speed is important. Speed is the product of stride length and stride frequency. Raising the ankle adds length to the part of the limb that determines stride length, that is from the shoulder or hip to the point of contact with the ground. Longer limbs take bigger strides, and digitigrade posture is therefore typical of mammals designed to run. Digitigrade animals also tend to have relatively long bones, or metapodials, making up the sole of the foot, adding further to total limb length. In addition, their limb muscles are much thicker close to the hip or shoulder joint, and taper towards the toes as long, elastic tendons. This construction reduces muscle mass near the ankles and feet, where the limb travels farthest during locomotion, and thus reduces inertial effects. A The skeletons of a bear and a domestic dog illustrate the difference between plantigrade and digitigrade postures. The dog is digitigrade, standing on its toes with the soles of its feet (metapodials) off the ground. By contrast, the soles of the bear's hindfeet are flat to the ground, as in humans, giving it a plantigrade posture. If one imagines the additional energy required to walk or run with ankle weights or heavy shoes, then the drawbacks of heavy feet become clear. There are yet further benefits to runners in having long tendinous muscle attachments. Tendons are elastic and act as energy-saving springs when running. They are stretched as the limb is flexed under the weight of the animal and then rebound, propelling the body forward and upward. So, digitigrade posture, long metapodials, and compact muscles with stretchy tendons are typical of carnivores built for speed. Bears are clearly not built for speed. Although their forefeet are semi-digitigrade, their hind-feet are plantigrade. Moreover, their metapodials are short and their muscles thick throughout the length of the limb. In many ways, bears are built more like badgers than other similar-sized carnivores, such as tigers, and it shows in their speed. The top speed recorded for both black and brown bears is 50 kilometers (30 miles) per hour, whereas the range for the fully digitigrade lion and wolf is 55 to 65 kilometers (35 to 40 miles) per hour. If bears are not built for speed, then what does the combination of massive limbs, plantigrade hindfeet, cumbersome paws, and a short back provide? Strength and mobility of limb movement are the answers. The stout limbs of bears are capable of producing large forces over a much greater range of motion than those of dogs or even cats. Bears use these capabilities when digging for food or shelter, fishing for salmon, climbing to escape danger, and battling with members of their own species as well as other predators. Imagine a wolf trying to perform a bear hug or climb a tree. Dogs have forfeited these abilities in favor of speed. Cats are more like bears in their range of possible movements, but lack strength. Bears may not be able to outrun danger, but can successfully defend themselves through brute force. Reply
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Also, unlike any other carnivore, an ursine can also dissipate brute strength, which is slow and constant-growing strength as well (kind of like us as well).
Cats and dogs, big and small, are only able to display power movements because their muscle fibers and speed-designed bodies are built for doing so. For them, displaying brute strength would be like shaking their limbs repetitively in powerful motions in order to get the object to budge. A bear can smoothly and consistently move the object since it can linearly increase its strength without having to use power/over-exertion. For a semi-omnivore, this is very helpful in the wilderness for obvious reasons. So if a flattened-out dumpster lid of 500-pounds, provided with extreme tension durability, was lying in the middle of a road, the bear would be able to both easily turn the lid over and exert constant force to bend the lid in half; canids and felids are only able to do the former. The lid's tension strength would be too much for the dog's/cat's lack of type-Ib slow-twitch fibers.
The Bear Almanac by Gary Brown.
Bears possess enormous strength, regardless of species or size. The strength of a bear is difficult to measure, but observations alone ( bears moving rocks, carrying animal carcasses, removing large logs from the side of a cabin, and digging cavernous holes ) are indicative of incredible power. A study team at Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana, found that a grizzly bear could treat a 700-pound dumpster like a beach ball, while it took a minimum of two persons just to tip the dumpster. The team concluded the strength of a calm grizzly bear is two-and-a-half times that of a human. No animal of equal size is as powerful. A bear may kill a moose, an elk, or a deer by a single blow to the neck with a powerful foreleg, then lift the carcass in its mouth and carry it for great distances. "The strength ... is in keeping with his size," describes Ben East in 'Bears'. "He is very powerfully built, a heavy skeleton overlaid with thick layers of muscle as strong as rawhide rope. He can hook his long, grizzly-like front claws under a slab of rock that three grown men could not lift, and flip it over effortlessly... A brown bear took a thousand-pound steer a half mile up an almost vertical mountain, much of the way through alder tangles with trunks three or four inches thick." Strength and power are not only attributes of large bears, but also of the young. The author observed a yearling American black bear searching for insects turn over a flat-shaped rock that was between 310 and 325 pounds "backhanded" with a foreleg. The bear was captured the following day in a management action and was found to weigh only 120 pounds 
Very interesting. There is a fact stated there that a bear can kill with one blow to the neck. But big cats are known to swipe at the jugular and if with correct contact that is almost always lethal. This is without carrying that "excess" weight as we are talking about hunting, at least in that bit. The superioir weaponary edges that cat for me, split differences like those do it for me. In terms of deadliness in relation to size the cat wins. At least in terms of whatever we are classifying as explosiveness.
If we are taking strength at face value, the bear wins. Blunt but true I'm sure we can agree as brotherbear has given examples of above. The bear is literally a powerhouse. I don't really think it's fair to compare these animals though, not to sound too cliched but they have unmatchable abilities in what they have been evolved to do. The bear was evolved to fight face to face, to hunt using stamina, and to foriage using it's giant nasal cavity. The cat to move in stealthiness and dispatch of their prey using their weaponary instead of their "strength" really. Defining power to suit both of these animals is near impossible if you want a fair comparison. ps sorry if it sounds sloppy, it's pretty late and I'm really tired 
The bears can sometimes be strong in a ridiculous way, since they are physically designated to traumatize their opponents/preys in a wrestling match.
A grizzly to wear down a bison three times of its own size and the smaller bear to occasionally fight off a big cat bigger than itself are not mere coincidence.
The Grizzly Almanac by Robert H. Busch.
Alberta bear biologist Gordon Stenhouse once watched a large grizzly running effortlessly down a steep mountain slope carrying a 300-pound sheep in its mouth. "The power of these animals is just awesome," he says ( quoted in Struzik, 1999 ).
Then how does this power arrive from the bear's "supposed" lack of fast-twitch muscles?
Obviously, with a bear and an equally-weighted cat, the bear has thicker hindlimbs and similar or thicker forelimbs than the cat (depending on species of both). Since fast-twitch muscles are the least densest, and make up the most volume of almost any animals limbs, then shouldn't that hint that the bear has more fast twitch muscles in its forelimbs? Cats (like early hominids and us) tend to have a bigger arm girth/chest girth ratio than bears (and early primates.) So at equal weights, cats have heavier arms than bears, and if the bear's limbs are still just as big, it should definitely hint at a higher fast-twitch muscle ratio. Back on another thread, I remember posting an article about older bears being stronger than younger ones. The prime-aged male bear had about 50% of its total musculature comprised of fast-twitch muscles, and big cats like tigers and lions usually have 70-75%, and saber-toothed cats up to ~85%. I don't know where to go from there, though...
Determining differences between a bear's kinesiology and a cat's kinesiology is like determining the differences between power and strength.
This is all a big paradox.
The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson.
Monarch - The Big Bear by Ernest Thompson Seton. Strong ropes, strong chains and bands of steel were at hand, with chloroform, lest he should revive too soon. Through holes in the roof with infinite toil they chained him, bound him - his paws to his neck, his neck and breast and hind legs to a bolted beam. Then raising the door, they dragged him out, not with horses - none would go near - but with a windlass to a tree; and fearing the sleep of death, they let him now revive. Chained and double chained, frenzied, foaming, and impotent, what words can tell the state of the fallen Monarch? They put him on a sled, and six horses with a long chain drew it by stages to the plain, to the railway. They fed him enough to save his life. A great steam-derrick lifted Bear and beam and chain on to a flatcar, a tarpaulin was spread above his helpless form; the engine puffed, pulled out; and the Grizzly King was gone from his ancient hills. So they brought him to the great city, the Monarch born, in chains. They put him in a cage not merely strong enough for a lion, but thrice as strong, and once a rope gave way as the huge one strained his bonds. "He is loose," went the cry, and an army of onlookers and keepers fled; only the small man with the calm eye and the big man of the hills were stanch, so the Monarch was still held. Free in the cage, he swung round, looked this way and that, then heaved his powers against the triple angling steel and wrenched the cage so not a part of it was square. In time he clearly would break out. They dragged the prisoner to another that an elephant could not break down, but it stood on the ground, and in an hour the great beast had a cavern into the earth and was sinking out of sight, till a stream of water sent after him filled the hole and forced him again to view. They moved him to a new cage made for him since he came - a hard rock floor, great bars of nearly two-inch steel that reached up nine feet and then projected in for five. The Monarch wheeled once around, then rearing, raised his ponderous bulk, wrenching those bars, unbreakable, and bent and turned them in their sockets with one heave till the five-foot spears were pointed out, and then sprang to climb. Nothing but spikes and blazing brands in a dozen ruthless hands could hold him back. The keepers watched him night and day till a stronger cage was made, impregnable with a steel above and rocks below. (05-28-2016, 06:48 AM)SVTIGRIS Wrote: Very interesting. There is a fact stated there that a bear can kill with one blow to the neck. But big cats are known to swipe at the jugular and if with correct contact that is almost always lethal. This is without carrying that "excess" weight as we are talking about hunting, at least in that bit. The superioir weaponary edges that cat for me, split differences like those do it for me. In terms of deadliness in relation to size the cat wins. At least in terms of whatever we are classifying as explosiveness. Cats are strong too, just not the type of "strong" people usually mean. Strength = "Maximum contraction of force at any given time." Power = "Maximum contraction of force for a given time interval." Cats actually do well fighting face-to-face too, the only problem is: - They usually don't have enough stamina as a bear. - A bear is a much better grappler AND striker, just as agile as any cat, and can be just as powerful as any cat, so they are still about equal at the beginning which is bad for the cat. Don't underestimate the big cats, though. Bears can't easily leap over a 10-foot fence because they were not designed to hop vertically as much as horizontally. Bears can't reach the maximum running speeds of big cats, but they can certainly accelerate just as fast as a pantherine! Bears can't climb as tree with prey as well as a leopard or jaguar can, but a sloth or sun bear can certainly climb a tree as well as the two cats, but without the prey. Cats and bears are of a very similar level when it comes to agility.
The topic here is "Bear Strength" and we might be making a mistake if we continue the topic comparing bears with big cats. Don't take me wrong; I am truthfully very interested in that topic but have learned from experience that big cat vs bear topics will nearly always lead to heated arguments and hard feelings rather than friendly debates - just my opinion.
The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson - The Trouble with Grizzlies by Thomas Hardin. With the hide off, the carcass of a grizzly looked like the naked body of a grotesque and tremendously powerful man. The great ropes of muscle show where the bears get their strength. They can crush the head of a moose or a buffalo with one blow, literally powder the backbone of the largest steer. I once saw a rather small female grizzly uproot the stump of a dead timberline tree with one smooth, effortless pull. apparently she did it as easily as a tractor would have done. Grizzlies have been known to carry away the entire carcass of a bull elk that would weigh from 700 to 800 pounds, and to drag that of a bull moose for a mile - and a big bull will weigh 1,200 or 1,300. When a grizzly puts his mind to it, he can break open the door of a trapper's cabin as if he were an animated battering ram. For his size, he is one of the most powerful beasts that walks the earth.  |
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