Looking for:
Where are sun bears mostly foundWhere are sun bears mostly found -
They have an extremely long tongue. On the chest they have a yellow-cream coloured crescent-shaped mark. The short, sleek fur is black and the ears are small and round. Diet The Malayan sun bear eats primarily fruits and vegetables, such as young tips of palm trees as well as the sprouts. Latin name Scientific Name Helarctos malayanus. Population How many? There are no reliable population figures. Physical Description The sun bear can be clearly distinguished from other bears by a white or yellowish patch on the chest.
Sun bears are excellent climbers and spend considerable time in trees. They feed on sweet fruits, small rodents, birds, termites, and other insects.
Size Length: cm Weight: kg Habitat Southeast Asian tropical forests, including tropical evergreen rainforest, montane forest and swamp habitat. However, it has mostly disappeared in recent decades from most of its former ranges. The sun bear tends to avoid heavily logged forests and areas close to human settlement.
Fossil remains suggest its occurrence farther north during the Pleistocene ; it may have occurred as far south as Java in the middle to Late Pleistocene. Today, it has been eliminated from the majority of its erstwhile range, especially in Thailand; populations are declining in most of the range countries.
It disappeared from Singapore during the s and s, possibly due to extensive deforestation. Sun bear populations appear to decrease in size northward from Sundaland , and numbers are especially low in the northern and western extremes of the range. This has possibly been the case since prehistoric times and is not a result of human interference. Habitat fragmentation is on the rise particularly in Borneo, Sumatra and some areas of the mainland range.
Heavy deforestation due to agriculture, logging and forest fires and hunting for wildlife trade are severe threats throughout the range; human-bear conflicts are a relatively minor threat. In the island of Borneo sun bears were found to be hunted by python in their most vulnerable state. In Southeast Asia, the Panthera pardus male leopard has been photographed with a sun bear cub being held by the throat. This reported case has been reported to be the second confirmed predator as of Studies have found evidence of pet trade and sale of sun bear parts such as gall bladders in traditional Chinese medicine TCM shops in Sabah and Sarawak.
Poaching is common in several countries in the region. A report documented rampant poaching and trade in sun bear parts in Sarawak, more than anywhere else in Malaysia; the researchers recommended stricter legislations in the state to protect local sun bears.
The Bornean Sun Bear Conservation Centre , founded by Wong Siew Te in Sabah Malaysia in , aims to work for the welfare of sun bears rescued from poor conditions in captivity and spread awareness about their conservation. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Bear from tropical forests of Southeast Asia. For the author, see Sun Bear author. Conservation status. Vulnerable IUCN 3. Raffles , Retrieved 16 January In Wilson, D. Johns Hopkins University Press.
ISBN OCLC Mammalian Species. S2CID In Kemmerer, L. Boston: Brill. An Intermediate Greek—English Lexicon. Oxford: Clarendon Press. A Visual Celebration of Borneo's Wildlife.
Singapore: Bjorn Olesen Wildlife Photography. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Texas: University of Texas Press. Descriptive catalogue of a zoological collection, made on account of the honourable East India Company, in the island of Sumatra and its vicinity, under the direction of Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, Lieutenant-Governor of Fort Marlborough; with additional notices illustrative of the natural history of those countries".
Transactions of the Linnean Society of London. The Zoological Journal. Bulletin of the Raffles Museum. Checklist of Palaearctic and Indian mammals to 2nd ed. London: British Museum of Natural History.
Raffles Bulletin of Zoology. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London. Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society. Zoological Research. In Servheen, C. International Zoo Yearbook. American Museum Novitates : 1— JSTOR PMID Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society.
CiteSeerX BMC Evolutionary Biology. PMC Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. New York: Selmar Press. London: Taylor and Francis.
In Stirling, I. Bears, Majestic Creatures of the Wild. Pennsylvania: Rodale Press. Great Bear Almanac. The Lyons Press.
Journal of Wildlife Management. The Malayan sun bear on Borneo, with special emphasis on its conservation status in Kalimantan, Indonesia Report. Journal of Zoology. Endangered Animals of Thailand. Florida: Sandhill Crane Press. Conservation Biology. Biodiversity and Conservation. Walker's Carnivores of the World. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Biological Conservation. Archived from the original PDF on 11 May Retrieved Scientific Reports.
Bibcode : NatSR Smithsonian Magazine. Gland: International Union for Conservation of Nature. Archived from the original PDF on Travels in the East Asian Archipelago. London: John Murray. Wildlife Biology. Cambridge: Darwin College. Biogeographical realms. WWF Biomes. Mangrove, Tropical dry forest, Tropical moist forests.
Biome Forest. Anthropogenic biome. Montane forest. Climate zones Tropical. Habits and Lifestyle Sun bears lead the most arboreal tree-living lifestyle among all bears. Group name. Seasonal behavior. Diet and Nutrition Sun bears are omnivores and bees, beehives, and honey are their important food items. Diet Omnivore. Population Trend. Vulnerable VU. Population Population threats The two major threats to Sun bears are habitat loss and commercial hunting. Ecological niche Sun bears play an important role in the ecosystem, dispersing seeds and thus sustaining the environment.
Fun Facts for Kids Sun bears have incredibly long tongues which can be over 10 inches long! When foraging Sun bears tear open hollow trees with their long, sharp claws and teeth in search of wild bees and honey. They also break termite mounds and quickly lick and suck the contents, holding pieces of the broken mound with their front paws.
They consume figs in large amounts and like to eat them whole. Sun bears are noted for their intelligence; a captive bear observed sugar being stored in a cupboard then locked by a key, and later used its own claw to open the lock. Sun bears stand on their hind feet for a broader view of their surroundings or smell far-off objects; they try to intimidate their enemies by displaying the chest patch if threatened.
Sun bear cubs are usually kept on buttress roots at the base of trees until they learn how to walk and climb properly.
References 1. Included in Lists Mammals of Brunei. Threatened Species of China.
No comments:
Post a Comment