Brown Bear

Happy Bear Awareness Week!

Common Name: Brown Bear Latin Name: Ursus arctos Location: northern North America, Europe, and Asia Conservation Status: Least Concern

A brown bear's weight can vary widely depending on the time of year and where they are located. Brown bears eat whatever they find in season, which includes a wide variety of plants, salmon, small animals, carrion, insects and fungi. A coastal Alaskan bear living on a diet of spawning salmon may reach 1,300 pounds, while a mostly herbivorous inland grizzly bear can weigh as little as 350 pounds. They can eat up to 30 pounds of food a day to store fat for the winter. A brown bear loses about 2 pounds of fat each day during winter sleep. Some bears are 50% lighter when they come out of their dens in the spring.

Photographed at Minnesota Zoo FujiFilm FinePix S5100 September 29, 2008