On May 5, William Clark and George Droulliard killed an enormous grizzly bear, with some effort. Clark described it as a “verry large and a turrible looking animal, which we found verry hard to kill we Shot ten Balls into him before we killed him, & 5 of those Balls through his lights.” Lewis estimated the weight of the bear at 500-600 pounds, about twice the size of the average black bear. He noted that after the bear was shot, “he swam more than half the distance across the river to a sandbar & it was at least twenty minutes before he died
I dont think it would have a huge affect, muskets could probably handle them, the affects on native american culture would be much larger, I could see it became a holy animal for some tribes.
I dont think it would have a huge affect, muskets could probably handle them, the affects on native american culture would be much larger, I could see it became a holy animal for some tribes.
The short-faced bear was primarily a kleptoparasite, it didn't hunt its own food but rather just stole the kills made by smaller predators. Even if it hadn't died out because the larger prey animals had died off (like how the dire wolves died out leaving their smaller cousins the grey wolves to survive), once settlers got past the initial fear, they'd most likely start shooting it with bullets, arrows or spears (whatever they had available) from a distance.
From what I saw, but I can be wrong, he was more of a carrion-eater or an opportunistic predatory.
Which would probably make him as hunted by europeans that he probably was by natives, IMO. I don't see much significant changes into settlement pattern, except if it does have some "marketable" characteristics that european bears wouldn't have.
(A bit like american beavers presence, for pelt trade, was a factor, for exemple)
Wiki and online specialized articles. Hence what I "saw" rather than know.Could I see your sources?
I saw that he could have a jaw musculature able to, tough.The short face bear didn't have the bone crushing adaption
Apparently the "lighter" depiction of the short-faced-bear may have been criticized, in favor of a more massive depiction, with the few males specimens supposing to have reached the metric ton for a relatively significant number, females being close to modern grizzlies.I'd imagine a carrion eater would be larger in order to chase off other predators.
Wiki and online specialized articles. Hence what I "saw" rather than know.
Any info about their brain size relative to other bears?
There are a number of nasty predators in the Americas, Grizzly and Jaguar being the biggest and baddest. If the Short faced bear was still around then it would just make one more to be dealt with.