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Short Faced Bear
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Species
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Arctodus
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Size
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12 feet (3.657 meters) tall, 1500-2500 pounds
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Abilities/weaponry
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Huge forelimbs, big blunt claws, big blunt teeth, massive size and strength, considerable speed and stamina, large brain, loud roar, long distances using smooth local motion, incredible sense of smell and problem solving skills, hunting strategy
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Turf
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North America
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Diet
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Carnivore
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Timespan
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Late Pleistocene 10,000 Ka
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Appearances
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First appearance: "Ice Age Monsters" (only appearance)
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Arctodus ("bear tooth"), also known as the Short-faced bear, is an extinct genus of bear endemic to North America during the Pleistocene ~3.0 Ma.—11,000 years ago, existing for approximately three million years. Arctodus simus may have once been Earth's largest mammalian, terrestrial carnivore. It was the most common of early North American bears, being most abundant in California.
Arctodus appeared in the episode "Ice Age Monsters", the ninth episode of Jurassic Fight Club and the only to take place in the Pleistocene. In the episode, Arctodus fights an American Lion over a carcass. He gets swiped in the face and gets bitten on the throat, but towers over the lion and throws his enemy into a cave.
Description[]
Based on the skeletons that have been found, Arctodus stood 12 feet tall on its hind legs and weighed as much as 2,500 pounds, twice as large as the largest bears living today. Besides its enormous size, Arctodus had several features that sets it apart from modern bears, including oversized teeth and a short muzzle relative to his wide skull, a fact that earned its nickname, the Short-faced bear or Bulldog bear.
It also had unusually long front legs. In fact, its front and back legs were equal in length, as opposed to the shorter front legs seen in modern bears. This adaptation might have allowed Arctodus to reach speeds of more than 45 mph and travel much greater distances than modern-day bears, which can only run for a short distance and run 35 mph.
Fighting style[]
One of the giant bear's lethal weapons as a predator was its massive paws, equipped with long blunt claws and powered by a strong upper body. Its teeth also had the strength to crush bone with a force that could reach more than 2,000 pounds per square inch. Arctodus was well-adapted for close combat situations as it could intimidate with its sheer size and strength to throw down and crush its enemies.
Diet[]
Most scientists believe Arctodus was an apex predator in its habitat because it could run down and overpower its prey mainly-bison, but perhaps also larger animals such as wooly mammoths. Others have argued that despite having the size necessary to be a mega-predator, Arctodus was too light-boned to be able to bring down such huge prey. Some of them think instead that the giant bear was a scavenger, relying mainly on the kills of other predators for survival.
Trivia[]
- The giant bear, Arctodus simus can be distinguished from another type of North American short-faced bear, Arctodus pristinus by its superior size. The closest living relative to the short-faced bear that exists today is Tremarctos ornatus, more commonly known as the spectacled bear of South America.