The sloth bear (''Melursus ursinus'') is a myrmecophagous

bear Bears are carnivoran mammals of the family Ursidae. They are classified as caniforms, or doglike carnivorans. Although only eight species of bears are extant, they are widespread, appearing in a wide variety of habitats throughout the Nort ...

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of ...

native to the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a physiographical region in Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian Ocean from the Himalayas. Geopolitically, it includes the countries of Bangladesh, Bhutan, Ind ...

. It feeds on

fruit In botany, a fruit is the seed-bearing structure in flowering plants that is formed from the ovary after flowering. Fruits are the means by which flowering plants (also known as angiosperms) disseminate their seeds. Edible fruits in parti ...

ants Ants are eusocial insects of the family Formicidae and, along with the related wasps and bees, belong to the order Hymenoptera. Ants evolved from vespoid wasp ancestors in the Cretaceous period. More than 13,800 of an estimated total o ...

and

termites Termites are small insects that live in colonies and have distinct castes (eusocial) and feed on wood or other dead plant matter. Termites comprise the infraorder Isoptera, or alternatively the epifamily Termitoidae, within the order Blattod ...

. It is listed as vulnerable on the

IUCN Red List The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is the world's most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biolog ...

, mainly because of

habitat loss Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...

and degradation. It is the only species in the genus ''Melursus''. It has also been called "labiated bear" because of its long lower lip and palate used for sucking up insects. It has a long, shaggy fur, a mane around the face, and long, sickle-shaped claws. It is lankier than

brown Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model us ...

and

Asian black bear The Asian black bear (''Ursus thibetanus''), also known as the Asiatic black bear, moon bear and white-chested bear, is a medium-sized bear species native to Asia that is largely adapted to an arboreal lifestyle. It lives in the Himalayas, sout ...

s. It shares features of insectivorous mammals and evolved during the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the '' Ice age'') is the geological epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was finally confirmed i ...

from the ancestral brown bear through

divergent evolution Divergent evolution or divergent selection is the accumulation of differences between closely related populations within a species, leading to speciation. Divergent evolution is typically exhibited when two populations become separated by a geog ...

. Sloth bears breed during spring and early summer and give birth near the beginning of winter. When their territories are encroached upon by humans, they sometimes attack them. Historically, humans have drastically reduced these bears' habitat and diminished their population by hunting them for food and products such as their

bacula Bacula is an open-source, enterprise-level computer backup system for heterogeneous networks. It is designed to automate backup tasks that had often required intervention from a systems administrator or computer operator. Bacula supports Linux ...

and claws. Sloth bears have been tamed and used as performing animals and as pets.

Taxonomy

Shaw Shaw may refer to: Places Australia *Shaw, Queensland Canada * Shaw Street, a street in Toronto England * Shaw, Berkshire, a village * Shaw, Greater Manchester, a location in the parish of Shaw and Crompton * Shaw, Swindon, a suburb of Swindon ...

in 1791 named the species ''Bradypus ursinus''. In 1793, Meyer named it ''Melursus lybius'', and in 1817, de Blainville named it ''Ursus labiatus'' because of its long lips. Illiger named it ''Prochilus hirsutus'', the Greek genus name indicating long lips, while the specific name noted its long and coarse hair. Fischer called it ''Chondrorhynchus hirsutus'', while Tiedemann named it ''Ursus longirostris''.

Subspecies and range

Evolution

Sloth bears may have reached their current form in the Early

, the time when the bear family specialised and dispersed. A fragment of fossilised

humerus The humerus (; ) is a long bone in the arm that runs from the shoulder to the elbow. It connects the scapula and the two bones of the lower arm, the radius and ulna, and consists of three sections. The humeral upper extremity consists of a round ...

from the Pleistocene, found in

Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (, abbr. AP) is a state in the south-eastern coastal region of India. It is the seventh-largest state by area covering an area of and tenth-most populous state with 49,386,799 inhabitants. It is bordered by Telangana to the ...

's Kurnool Basin is identical to the humerus of a modern sloth bear. The fossilised skulls of a bear once named ''Melursus theobaldi'' found in the Shivaliks from the Early Pleistocene or Early

Pliocene The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58

Characteristics

Sloth bears adults are a medium-sized species though weight can range variously from in typically-sized females and from in typically-sized males. Exceptionally large specimens of females can scale up to and males up to . The average weight of sloth bears from the nominate subspecies in

Nepal Nepal (; ne, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mai ...

was in females and in males. Nominate bears in

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

were found to weigh average in males and in female per one study. Specimens from

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

(''M. u. inornatus'') may weigh up to in females and in males.de Silva Wijeyeratne, G. (2016).
Mammals of Sri Lanka
'. Bloomsbury Publishing. However six Sri Lankan male sloth bears averaged only and was the average for four females, so Sri Lankan bears could be up to at least 30% lighter in body mass than nominate race bears and with apparent far more pronounced size sexual dimorphism. They are high at the shoulder, and have a body length of .

Brown Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model us ...

, "Bear Anatomy and Physiology"Grzimek, B. (1990). ''Grzimeck's Encyclopedia of mammals'' (No. 599.03 G7). Besides being smaller than males, females reportedly typically have more fur between their shoulders. Sloth bear muzzles are thick and long, with small jaws and bulbous snouts with wide nostrils. They have long lower lips which can be stretched over the outer edge of their noses, and lack upper incisors, thus allowing them to suck up large numbers of insects. The premolars and molars are smaller than in other bears, as they do not chew as much vegetation. In adults, the teeth are usually in poor condition, due to the amount of soil they suck up and chew when feeding on insects. The back of the

palate The palate () is the roof of the mouth in humans and other mammals. It separates the oral cavity from the nasal cavity. A similar structure is found in crocodilians, but in most other tetrapods, the oral and nasal cavities are not truly sepa ...

is long and broad, as is typical in other ant-eating mammals. The paws are disproportionately large, and have highly developed, sickle-shaped, blunt claws which measure in length. Their toe pads are connected by a hairless web. They have the longest

tail The tail is the section at the rear end of certain kinds of animals’ bodies; in general, the term refers to a distinct, flexible appendage to the torso. It is the part of the body that corresponds roughly to the sacrum and coccyx in mammals, ...

in the bear family, which can grow to . Their back legs are not very strong, though they are knee-jointed, and allow them to assume almost any position. The ears are very large and floppy. The sloth bear is the only bear with long hair on its ears. Sloth bear fur is completely black (rusty for some specimens), save for a whitish Y- or V-shaped mark on the chest. This feature is sometimes absent, particularly in Sri Lankan specimens. This feature, which is also present in Asian black bears and

sun bear The sun bear (''Helarctos malayanus'') is a species in the family Ursidae (the only species in the genus ''Helarctos'') occurring in the tropical forests of Southeast Asia. It is the smallest bear, standing nearly at the shoulder and weighin ...

s, is thought to serve as a threat display, as all three species are

sympatric In biology, two related species or populations are considered sympatric when they exist in the same geographic area and thus frequently encounter one another. An initially interbreeding population that splits into two or more distinct species s ...

with

tiger The tiger (''Panthera tigris'') is the largest living Felidae, cat species and a member of the genus ''Panthera''. It is most recognisable for its dark vertical stripes on orange fur with a white underside. An apex predator, it primarily pr ...

s (tigers usually do not carry out attacks on an adult bear if the bear is aware or facing the cat). The coat is long, shaggy, and unkempt, despite the relatively warm environment in which the species is found, and is particularly heavy behind the neck and between the shoulders, forming a mane which can be long. The belly and underlegs can be almost bare. Sloth bears are usually about the same size as an

but are immediately distinctive for their shaggier coat, whitish claws, as well as their typically rangier build. Their head and mouth is highly distinct from that of a black bear with a longer, narrower skull shape (particularly the snout), loose-looking, flappier lips and paler muzzle colour. In few areas of overlap, sloth bear confusion with

s is unlikely, given the latter species considerably smaller size, much shorter fur, wrinkled folding skin (especially around the back), bolder chest marking and drastically different, more compact head structure and appearance.WildLifeInformation.org
, ''Melursus ursinus – Sloth bear''

Distribution and habitat

Sri Lankan sloth bear (Melursus ursinus inornatus) male 6

The sloth bear's global range includes

, the

Terai , image =Terai nepal.jpg , image_size = , image_alt = , caption =Aerial view of Terai plains near Biratnagar, Nepal , map = , map_size = , map_alt = , map_caption = , biogeographic_realm = Indomalayan realm , global200 = Terai-Duar savanna ...

, temperate climatic zones of

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountainou ...

and

. It occurs in a wide range of habitats including moist and dry tropical forests,

savannah A savanna or savannah is a mixed woodland-grassland (i.e. grassy woodland) ecosystem characterised by the trees being sufficiently widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach the ground to ...

s, scrublands and

grassland A grassland is an area where the vegetation is dominated by grasses (Poaceae). However, sedge ( Cyperaceae) and rush (Juncaceae) can also be found along with variable proportions of legumes, like clover, and other herbs. Grasslands occur natu ...

s below on the Indian subcontinent, and below in Sri Lanka's

dry forest Dry or dryness most often refers to: * Lack of rainfall, which may refer to **Arid regions **Drought * Dry or dry area, relating to legal prohibition of selling, serving, or imbibing alcoholic beverages * Dry humor, deadpan * Dryness (medical) ...

s. It is regionally extinct in Bangladesh.

Behaviour and ecology

Adult sloth bears may travel in pairs. Males are often observed to be gentle with cubs. They may fight for food. They walk in a slow, shambling motion, with their feet being set down in a noisy, flapping motion. They are capable of galloping faster than running humans.

, "Bear Behavior and Activities" Although they appear slow and clumsy, both young and adult sloth bears are excellent climbers. They occasionally will climb to feed and to rest, though not to escape enemies, as they prefer to stand their ground. Sloth bear mothers carry their cubs up trees as the primary defense against attacks by predators instead of sending them up trees. The cubs can be threatened by predators such as tigers, leopards, and other bears. They are adequate climbers on more accessible trees but cannot climb as quickly or on as varied surfaces as can black bears due to the sloth species' more elongated claw structure. Given their smaller size and still shorter claws, sloth bear cubs probably climb more proficiently than adults (much as brown bear cubs can climb well but not adults). They are good swimmers, and primarily enter water to play. To mark their territories, sloth bears scrape trees with their forepaws, and rub against them with their flanks. Sloth bears are recorded to produce several sounds and vocals. Howls, squeals, screams, barks and trumpet-like calls are made during aggressive encounters while huffing is made as a warning signal. Chuffing calls are made when disturbed. Females keep in contact with their cubs with a grunt-whicker while cubs yelp when separated.

Reproduction

The breeding season for sloth bears varies according to location: in India, they mate in April, May, and June, and give birth in December and early January, while in Sri Lanka, it occurs all year. Sows gestate for 210 days, and typically give birth in caves or in shelters under boulders. Litters usually consist of one or two cubs, or rarely three. Cubs are born blind, and open their eyes after four weeks. Sloth bear cubs develop quickly compared to most other bear species: they start walking a month after birth, become independent at 24–36 months, and become sexually mature at the age of three years. Young cubs ride on their mother's back when she walks, runs, or climbs trees until they reach a third of her size. Individual riding positions are maintained by cubs through fighting. Intervals between litters can last two to three years.

Dietary habits

Sloth bears are expert hunters of

and

, which they locate by smell. On arriving at a mound, they scrape at the structure with their claws till they reach the large combs at the bottom of the galleries, and disperse the soil with violent puffs. The termites are then sucked up through the muzzle, producing a sucking sound which can be heard 180 m away. Their sense of smell is strong enough to detect grubs 3 ft below ground. Unlike other bears, they do not congregate in feeding groups. Sloth bears may supplement their diets with fruit, plant matter, carrion, and very rarely other mammals. In March and April, they eat the fallen petals of mowha trees and are partial to

mango A mango is an edible stone fruit produced by the tropical tree ''Mangifera indica''. It is believed to have originated in the region between northwestern Myanmar, Bangladesh, and northeastern India. ''M. indica'' has been cultivated in South ...

es,

sugar cane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of (often hybrid) tall, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fibrous stalks ...

jackfruit The jackfruit (''Artocarpus heterophyllus''), also known as jack tree, is a species of tree in the fig, mulberry, and breadfruit family (Moraceae). Its origin is in the region between the Western Ghats of southern India, all of Bangladesh, Sr ...

, and the pods of the golden shower tree. Sloth bears are extremely fond of honey. When feeding their cubs, sows are reported to regurgitate a mixture of half-digested jack fruit, wood apples, and pieces of

honeycomb A honeycomb is a mass of hexagonal prismatic wax cells built by honey bees in their nests to contain their larvae and stores of honey and pollen. Beekeepers may remove the entire honeycomb to harvest honey. Honey bees consume about of honey ...

. This sticky substance hardens into a dark yellow, circular, bread-like mass which is fed to the cubs. This "bear's bread" is considered a delicacy by some of India's natives. Rarely, Sloth bears can become addicted to sweets in hotel waste visiting rubbish bins even inside populated towns all year long. In Neyyar Wildlife Sanctuary, Kerala, seeds of six tree species eaten and excreted by sloth bears (''Artocarpus hirsuta'', ''A. integrifolia'', ''Cassia fistula'', ''Mangifera indica'', ''Zizyphus oenoplina'') did not see significantly different percentages of germination (appearance of cotyledon) when compared to germinated seeds that had not been passed through the gut of the bears. However, seeds germinated much faster after being ingested by bears for three species, ''Artocarpus hirsuta, Cassia fistula,'' and ''Zizyphus oenoplina''. This experiment suggests that sloth bears may play an important role in seed dispersal and germination, with effects varying by tree species.

Relationships with other animals

The large canine teeth of sloth bears, relative to both its overall body size and to the size of the canine teeth of other bear species, and the aggressive disposition of sloth bears, may be a defense in interactions with large, dangerous animals, such as the

elephant Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae a ...

, and

rhinoceros A rhinoceros (; ; ), commonly abbreviated to rhino, is a member of any of the five extant species (or numerous extinct species) of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae. (It can also refer to a member of any of the extinct species ...

, as well as prehistoric species such as

Megantereon ''Megantereon'' was a genus of prehistoric machairodontine saber-toothed cat that lived in North America, Eurasia, and Africa. It may have been the ancestor of ''Smilodon''. Taxonomy Fossil fragments have been found in Africa, Eurasia, and ...

Bengal tiger The Bengal tiger is a population of the ''Panthera tigris tigris'' subspecies. It ranks among the biggest wild cats alive today. It is considered to belong to the world's charismatic megafauna. The tiger is estimated to have been present in ...

s occasionally prey on sloth bears. Tigers usually give sloth bears a wide berth, though some specimens may become habitual bear killers, and it is not uncommon to find sloth bear fur in tiger scats. Tigers typically hunt sloth bears by waiting for them near termite mounds, then creeping behind them and seizing them by the back of their necks and forcing them to the ground with their weight. One tiger was reported to simply break its victim's back with its paw, then wait for the paralysed bear to exhaust itself trying to escape before going in for the kill. When confronted by tigers face to face, sloth bears charge at them, crying loudly. A young or already sated tiger usually retreats from an assertive sloth bear, as the bear's claws can inflict serious wounds, and most tigers end the hunt if the bears become aware of the tiger's presence before the pounce. Sloth bears may scavenge on tiger kills. As tigers are known to mimic the calls of

sambar deer The sambar (''Rusa unicolor'') is a large deer native to the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia that is listed as a vulnerable species on the IUCN Red List since 2008. Populations have declined substantially due to severe hunting, local ins ...

to attract them, sloth bears react fearfully even to the sounds made by deer themselves. In 2011, a female bear with cubs was observed to stand her ground and prevail in a confrontation against two tigers (one female, one male) in rapid succession. Besides tigers there are few predators of sloth bears.

Leopard The leopard (''Panthera pardus'') is one of the five extant species in the genus ''Panthera'', a member of the cat family, Felidae. It occurs in a wide range in sub-Saharan Africa, in some parts of Western and Central Asia, Southern Russia, a ...

s can also be a threat, as they are able to follow sloth bears up trees. Bear cubs are probably far more vulnerable and healthy adult bears may be avoided by leopards. One leopard killed a three-quarters grown female sloth bear in an apparently lengthy fight that culminated in the trees. Apparently, a sloth bear killed a leopard in a confrontation in

Yala National Park Yala (යාල) National Park is the most visited and second largest national park in Sri Lanka, bordering the Indian Ocean. The park consists of five blocks, two of which are now open to the public, and also adjoining parks. The blocks have in ...

but was itself badly injured in the fight and was subsequently put down by park rangers. Sloth bears occasionally chase leopards from their kills.

Dhole The dhole (''Cuon alpinus''; ) is a canid native to Central, South, East and Southeast Asia. Other English names for the species include Asian wild dog, Asiatic wild dog, Indian wild dog, whistling dog, red dog, red wolf, and mountain wolf. ...

packs may attack sloth bears. When attacking them, dholes try to prevent the bear from retreating into caves. Unlike tigers which prey on sloth bears of all size, there is little evidence that dholes are a threat to fully-grown sloth bears other than exceptionally rare cases. In one case, a

golden jackal The golden jackal (''Canis aureus''), also called common jackal, is a wolf-like canid that is native to Southeast Europe, Southwest Asia, South Asia, and regions of Southeast Asia. The golden jackal's coat varies in color from a pale creamy ...

(a species much smaller and less powerful than a sloth bear and not generally a pack hunter as is the dhole) was seen to aggressively displace an adult bear which passively loped away from the snapping canid, indicating the sloth bear does not regard other carnivores as competition. Sloth bears are

with

Asiatic black bear The Asian black bear (''Ursus thibetanus''), also known as the Asiatic black bear, moon bear and white-chested bear, is a medium-sized bear species native to Asia that is largely adapted to an arboreal lifestyle. It lives in the Himalayas, sout ...

s in northern India, and the two species, along with the

, coexist in some of the national parks and wildlife sanctuaries. They are also found together in Assam, Manipur, and Mizoram, in the hills south of the

Brahmaputra River The Brahmaputra is a trans-boundary river which flows through Tibet, northeast India, and Bangladesh. It is also known as the Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibetan, the Siang/Dihang River in Arunachali, Luit in Assamese, and Jamuna River in Bangla. ...

, the only places occupied by all three bear species. The three species do not act aggressively toward each other. This may be because the three species generally differ in habit and dietary preferences. Asian elephants apparently do not tolerate sloth bears in their vicinity. The reason for this is unknown, as individual elephants known to maintain their composure near tigers have been reported to charge bears. The

Indian rhinoceros } The Indian rhinoceros (''Rhinoceros unicornis''), also called the Indian rhino, greater one-horned rhinoceros or great Indian rhinoceros, is a rhinoceros species native to the Indian subcontinent. It is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red Li ...

has a similar intolerance for sloth bears, and will charge at them.

Status and conservation

IUCN estimates that fewer than 20,000 sloth bears survive in the wilds of the Indian subcontinent and Sri Lanka. The sloth bear is listed in Schedule I of the Indian Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, which provides for their legal protection. Commercial international trade of the sloth bear (including parts and derivatives) is prohibited as it is listed in Appendix I of the

Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species CITES (shorter name for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, also known as the Washington Convention) is a multilateral treaty to protect endangered plants and animals from the threats of interna ...

. To address the human-bear conflict, people may be educated about the conservation ethics, particularly among locals. To resolve this conflict, the basic issue of deteriorating habitat, which is the reason for the conflict between people and bears, improvements through government or community-based reforestation programmes, may be promoted. The population of sloth bears grows when they live in high-profile reserves that protect species, such as tigers and elephants. Directly managed reserves could conserve the sloth bear, hence such reserves must be supported. Managing garbage, especially hotel waste with foods, is essential in situations where sloth bears get used to entering towns with an increase in the number of accidental attacks on humans. The government of India has banned use of sloth bears for entertainment, and a 'Sloth Bear Welfare Project' in the country has the objective of putting an end to their use for entertainment. However, their number in such activity is still large. Many organisations are helping in the conservation and preservation of sloth bears in safe places. Sloth bears previously used for entertainment are being rehabilitated in facilities like Agra Bear Rescue Facility run by Wildlife SOS and others. Major sloth bear sanctuaries in India include the Daroji bear sanctuary, Karnataka. Sloth bears have also been found dead in traps, electrocuted, or killed by other means by poachers, with body parts (i.e. canines, claws, gall bladder, paws, etc) usually removed for the illegal wildlife trade.

Relationships with humans

Attacks on humans

Sloth bears are one of the most aggressive extant bears and, due to large human populations often closely surrounding reserves that hold bears, aggressive encounters and attacks are relatively frequent, though in some places, attacks appear to be a reaction to encountering people accidentally. Going on raw numbers, this is the species of bear that most regularly attacks humans. Only the

Himalayan black bear The Himalayan black bear (''Ursus thibetanus laniger'') is a subspecies of the Asian black bear found in the Himalayas of India, Bhutan, Nepal, China, and Pakistan. Description It is distinguished from '' U. t. thibetanus'' by its longer, thicke ...

subspecies of Asian black bear is nearly as dangerous.Bargali, H. S., Akhtar, N., & Chauhan, N. P. S. (2005). ''Characteristics of sloth bear attacks and human casualties in North Bilaspur Forest Division, Chhattisgarh, India''. Ursus, 16(2), 263–267. Sloth bears likely view humans as potential predators, as their reactions to them (roaring, followed by retreat or charging) are similar to those evoked in the presence of tigers and leopards. Their long claws, which are ideally adapted for digging at termite mounds, make adults less capable of climbing trees to escape danger, as are other bears such as Asian black bears. Therefore, sloth bears have seemingly evolved to deal with threats by behaving aggressively. For the same reason, brown bears can be similarly inclined, accounting for the relatively high incidence of seemingly nonpredatory aggression towards humans in these two bear species. According to Robert Armitage Sterndale, in his ''Mammalia of India'' (1884, p. 62): Captain Williamson in his ''Oriental Field Sports'' wrote of how sloth bears rarely killed their human victims outright, but would suck and chew on their limbs till they were reduced to bloody pulps. One specimen, known as the sloth bear of Mysore, was responsible for the deaths of 12 people and the mutilation of 24 others. It was shot by Kenneth Anderson. Although sloth bears have attacked humans, they rarely become

man-eater A man-eater is an animal that preys on humans as a pattern of hunting behavior. This does not include the scavenging of corpses, a single attack born of opportunity or desperate hunger, or the incidental eating of a human that the animal has kil ...

s. Dunbar-Brander's ''Wild Animals of Central India'' mentions a case in which a sow with two cubs began a six-week reign of terror in Chanda, a district of the

Central Provinces The Central Provinces was a province of British India. It comprised British conquests from the Mughals and Marathas in central India, and covered parts of present-day Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra states. Its capital was Nagpu ...

, during which more than one of their victims had been eaten,''A Book of Man Eaters'' by Brigadier General R.G. Burton, Mittal Publications while the sloth bear of Mysore partially ate at least three of its victims. R.G. Burton deduced from comparing statistics that sloth bears killed more people than Asian black bears, and

Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...

considered them to be more dangerous than

American black bears The American black bear (''Ursus americanus''), also called simply a black bear or sometimes a baribal, is a medium-sized bear endemic to North America. It is the continent's smallest and most widely distributed bear species. American black bear ...

. Unlike some other bear species, which at times make mock charges at humans when surprised or frightened without making physical contact, sloth bears frequently appear to initiate a physical attack almost immediately. When people living near an aggressive population of sloth bears were armed with rifles, it was found that it was an ineffective form of defense, since the bear apparently charges and knocks the victim back (often knocking the rifle away) before the human has the chance to defend themself. In

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (, ; meaning 'central province') is a state in central India. Its capital city, capital is Bhopal, and the largest city is Indore, with Jabalpur, Ujjain, Gwalior, Sagar, Madhya Pradesh, Sagar, and Rewa, India, Rewa being the othe ...

, sloth bear attacks accounted for the deaths of 48 people and the injuring of 686 others between 1989 and 1994, probably due in part to the density of population and competition for food sources. A total of 137 attacks (resulting in 11 deaths) occurred between April 1998 and December 2000 in the North Bilaspur Forest Division of

Chhattisgarh Chhattisgarh (, ) is a landlocked state in Central India. It is the ninth largest state by area, and with a population of roughly 30 million, the seventeenth most populous. It borders seven states – Uttar Pradesh to the north, Madhya Pra ...

. The majority of attacks were perpetrated by single bears, and occurred in kitchen gardens, crop fields, and in adjoining forests during the monsoon season. One Mr. Watts Jones wrote a first-hand account of how it feels to be attacked by a sloth bear, recalling when he failed to score a direct hit against a bear he had targeted: In 2016, according to a forest official, a female bear had killed three people, and hurt five others in

Gujarat Gujarat (, ) is a state along the western coast of India. Its coastline of about is the longest in the country, most of which lies on the Kathiawar peninsula. Gujarat is the fifth-largest Indian state by area, covering some ; and the ninth- ...

State's

Banaskantha district Banaskantha district is one of the thirty-three districts of the Gujarat state of India. The administrative headquarters of the district is at Palanpur which is also its largest city. The district is located in the Northeast of Gujarat and is pr ...

, near Balaram Ambaji Wildlife Sanctuary, with some of the casualties being colleagues. At first, an attempt was made to trace and cage it, but this failed, costing the life of one official, and so a team of both officials and policemen shot the bear. In Karnataka's

Bellary district Bellary, officially known as Ballari (pronounced ), is a major district in Karnataka. It is located at north-eastern part of Karnataka. This district belongs to Kalyana-Karnataka. This district was one of the biggest districts in Karnataka un ...

, most of the attacks by sloth bears occurred outside forests, when they entered settlements and farmlands in search of food and water. In Mount Abu town in southern Rajasthan, sloth bears attacked people inside towns where they were seeking hotel waste in rubbish bins and encountered people by chance. Though such attacks were concomitant with increasing tourism activity, quite remarkably, local residents have not retaliated against the sloth bears. The absence of retaliation in many locations of India appears related to cultural norms and the dominant religion Hinduism where nature and animals are worshipped as deities.

Hunting and products

One method of hunting sloth bears involved the use of beaters, in which case, a hunter waiting on a post could either shoot the approaching bear through the shoulder or on the white chest mark if it was moving directly to him. Sloth bears are very resistant to body shots, and can charge hunters if wounded, though someone of steady nerves could score a direct hit from within a few paces of a charging bear. Sloth bears were easy to track during the wet season, as their clear footprints could be followed straight to their lairs. The majority of sloth bears killed in forests were due to chance encounters with them during hunts for other game. In hilly or mountainous regions, two methods were used to hunt them there. One was to lie in wait above the bear's lair at dawn and wait for the bear to return from its nocturnal foraging. Another was to rouse them at daytime by firing flares into the cave to draw them out. Sloth bears were also occasionally speared on horseback. In Sri Lanka, the

baculum The baculum (also penis bone, penile bone, or ''os penis'', ''os genitale'' or ''os priapi'') is a bone found in the penis of many placental mammals. It is absent from the human penis, but present in the penises of some primates, such as the ...

of a sloth bear was once used as a charm against barrenness.

Tameability

Officers in

British India The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one ...

often kept sloth bears as pets. The wife of Kenneth Anderson kept an orphaned sloth bear cub from Mysore, which she named "Bruno". The bear was fed all sorts of things and was very affectionate toward people. It was even taught numerous tricks, such as cradling a woodblock like a baby or pointing a bamboo stick like a gu

Dancing bears were historically a popular entertainment in India, dating back to the 13th century and the pre- Mughal era. The Kalandars, who practised the tradition of capturing sloth bears for entertainment purposes, were often employed in the courts of Mughal emperors to stage spectacles involving trained bears. They were once common in the towns of

Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, com ...

, where they often disturbed the horses of British officers. Despite a ban on the practice that was enacted in 1972, as many as 800 dancing bears were in the streets of India during the latter part of the 20th century, particularly on the highway between Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur. Sloth bear cubs, which were usually purchased at the age of six months from traders and poachers, were trained to dance and follow commands through coercive stimuli and starvation. Males were castrated at an early age, and their teeth were knocked out at the age of one year to prevent them from seriously injuring their handlers. The bears were typically fitted with a nose ring attached to a four-foot leash. Some were found to be blind from

malnutrition Malnutrition occurs when an organism gets too few or too many nutrients, resulting in health problems. Specifically, it is "a deficiency, excess, or imbalance of energy, protein and other nutrients" which adversely affects the body's tissues ...

.Dancing Bears in India
wildlifesos.org In 2009, following a seven-year campaign by a coalition of Indian and international animal welfare groups, the last Kalandar dancing bear was set free. The effort to end the practice involved helping the bear handlers find jobs and education, which enabled them to reduce their reliance on dancing-bear income.

Cultural references

Charles Catton included the bear in his 1788 book ''

Animals Drawn from Nature and Engraved in Aqua-tinta ''Animals Drawn from Nature and Engraved in Aqua-tinta'' is a book written and illustrated by Charles Catton the younger and published in London in 1788. It is a very early example of a work including hand-coloured aquatints. The thirty-six anim ...

'', describing it as an "animal of the bear-kind" and saying it was properly called the "Petre Bear". In

Rudyard Kipling Joseph Rudyard Kipling ( ; 30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936)'' The Times'', (London) 18 January 1936, p. 12. was an English novelist, short-story writer, poet, and journalist. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work. ...

's ''

The Jungle Book ''The Jungle Book'' (1894) is a collection of stories by the English author Rudyard Kipling. Most of the characters are animals such as Shere Khan the tiger and Baloo the bear, though a principal character is the boy or "man-cub" Mowgli, w ...

'',

Baloo Baloo (from hi, भालू ur, بھالو ''bhālū'' "bear") is a main fictional character featured in Rudyard Kipling's ''The Jungle Book'' from 1894 and '' The Second Jungle Book'' from 1895. Baloo, a sloth bear, is the strict teacher of ...

"the sleepy old brown bear" teaches the Law of the Jungle to the wolf cubs of the Seeonee wolf pack, as well as to his most challenging pupil, the "man-cub"

Mowgli Mowgli () is a fictional character and the protagonist of Rudyard Kipling's ''The Jungle Book'' stories. He is a feral boy from the Pench area in Seoni, Madhya Pradesh, India, who originally appeared in Kipling's short story "In the Rukh" (c ...

. Robert Armitage Sterndale, from whom Kipling derived most of his knowledge of Indian fauna, used the Hindustani word ''bhalu'' for several bear species, though Daniel Karlin, who edited the Penguin Classics reissue of ''The Jungle Book'' in 1989, stated, with the exception of colour, Kipling's descriptions of Baloo are consistent with the sloth bear, as brown bears and Asian black bears do not occur in the Seoni area where the novel takes place. Also, the name "sloth" can be used in the context of sleepiness. Karlin states, however, that Baloo's diet of ".. only roots and nuts and honey" is a trait more common to the Asian black bear than to the sloth bear. Local names: * gu, રીંછ, ''rīn̄ch''; also ''rinchh'' * hi, भालू, ''bhālū''; hi, रीछ, translit=rīch, label=none * or, ଭାଲୁ, ''bhālu'' * bn, শ্লথ ভালুক, ''ślath bhaluk''; ''kālō bhāluk''; also ''bhaluk'' * sa, ऋक्ष, ''ṛkṣa''; also ''rikspa'' * kn, ಕರಡಿ, ''karaḍi''; ''kaddi'' * ta, கரடி, ''karaṭi''; ''kaddi'' * ml, തേൻകരടി, ''tēnkaraṭi''; also ''pani karudi'' * te, ఎలుగుబంటి, ''elugubaṇṭi''; also ''elugu'' * mr, अस्वल, ''asval''; also ''aswal'' * Gond: ''yerid'', ''yedjal'' and ''asol'' * Kol: ''bana'' * Oraon: ''bir mendi'' * si, වලසා, ''valasā''; also ''usa'' *, bhālu *, ''richh''

References

Cited sources

* *

External links

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Field Trip Earth
– Field Trip Earth is a conservation education website operated by the North Carolina Zoological Society.

at ''Animal Diversity Web'' {{Authority control

Sloth Bear The sloth bear (''Melursus ursinus'') is a myrmecophagous bear species native to the Indian subcontinent. It feeds on fruits, ants and termites. It is listed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, mainly because of habitat loss and degradatio ...

Mammals of India Mammals of Nepal Mammals of Sri Lanka Myrmecophagous mammals Mammals described in 1791 Taxa named by George Shaw