[Applause]
[Music]
the closest North American relative to
the short-faced bear would be its cousin
the grizzly and while this bear may be
as fierce
there are many characteristics that are
very different 14,000 years ago the
grizzly lived on the same landscape as
the short-faced bear but they weren’t
competitors one quite simply dwarfed the
other dr. Matthews lays out three bear
skulls that tell a striking story what
what you looking at here is a skull of
the giant short-faced bear it here’s a
skull of a fairly good-sized grizzly
bear and this is a black bear the
short-faced bear would have been about
1,200 pounds this grizzly would have
been about 500 600 pounds and this black
bear 200 250 pounds walking on all fours
a grizzly bear is about three and a half
feet tall
the short-faced bear was 6 feet tall
and when it stood up this huge creature
measured eleven feet even amongst other
monsters it stood up
short-faced bear is quite a bit larger
two to three times the size of a grizzly
bear we’d see today and the question
always is why why such large size why
did this bear evolve to be such a giant
the scientists theorized that the size
of this bear made it a fearless hunter
able to kill very large prey unavailable
to other predators
one such brand was the Jefferson ground
sloth that weighed in at 2,000 pounds
although slow moving its massive size
was protection against smaller predators
like the saber-tooth cat or dire wolf
like today’s elephants on the African
plains the sloths massive size made it
difficult to kill if a sloth was
attacked by a short face of their it
would use its best defense sheer bulk
you can visualize the sloth rising up on
its hind legs to make itself appear
bigger and more impressive to chase off
a predator the sloth outweighed the lair
by more than 800 pounds but once the
bear stood up they were nearly the same
height I can see these two animals
rearing up and you would have like a
boxing match where they’re both up there
they’re swinging at each other in terms
of weaponry this bear had a pretty
amazing arsenal imagine the reach of
these long legs and sharp claws it would
be all like a boxer standing up with a
super long reach according to Greg
MacDonald the sloths best offense was to
inflict damage with its long sharp claws
the bear might be able to immobilize its
prey by either slashing open their
abdominal area or by crushing the sloths
shoulder with his powerful bite when you
think of how powerful its jaw was it
would have created a lot of force that
could certainly if it got ahold of an
animal’s limb would break it very
quickly with the with the jaw muscles
with his shoulder broken the slaw would
be defenseless
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
the closest North American relative to
the short-faced bear would be its cousin
the grizzly and while this bear may be
as fierce
there are many characteristics that are
very different 14,000 years ago the
grizzly lived on the same landscape as
the short-faced bear but they weren’t
competitors one quite simply dwarfed the
other dr. Matthews lays out three bear
skulls that tell a striking story what
what you looking at here is a skull of
the giant short-faced bear it here’s a
skull of a fairly good-sized grizzly
bear and this is a black bear the
short-faced bear would have been about
1,200 pounds this grizzly would have
been about 500 600 pounds and this black
bear 200 250 pounds walking on all fours
a grizzly bear is about three and a half
feet tall
the short-faced bear was 6 feet tall
and when it stood up this huge creature
measured eleven feet even amongst other
monsters it stood up
short-faced bear is quite a bit larger
two to three times the size of a grizzly
bear we’d see today and the question
always is why why such large size why
did this bear evolve to be such a giant
the scientists theorized that the size
of this bear made it a fearless hunter
able to kill very large prey unavailable
to other predators
one such brand was the Jefferson ground
sloth that weighed in at 2,000 pounds
although slow moving its massive size
was protection against smaller predators
like the saber-tooth cat or dire wolf
like today’s elephants on the African
plains the sloths massive size made it
difficult to kill if a sloth was
attacked by a short face of their it
would use its best defense sheer bulk
you can visualize the sloth rising up on
its hind legs to make itself appear
bigger and more impressive to chase off
a predator the sloth outweighed the lair
by more than 800 pounds but once the
bear stood up they were nearly the same
height I can see these two animals
rearing up and you would have like a
boxing match where they’re both up there
they’re swinging at each other in terms
of weaponry this bear had a pretty
amazing arsenal imagine the reach of
these long legs and sharp claws it would
be all like a boxer standing up with a
super long reach according to Greg
MacDonald the sloths best offense was to
inflict damage with its long sharp claws
the bear might be able to immobilize its
prey by either slashing open their
abdominal area or by crushing the sloths
shoulder with his powerful bite when you
think of how powerful its jaw was it
would have created a lot of force that
could certainly if it got ahold of an
animal’s limb would break it very
quickly with the with the jaw muscles
with his shoulder broken the slaw would
be defenseless
[Applause]
[Music]
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