I knew they were big bears but not TWICE A HUMAN size! I didn’t even google this image for the polar bear I wanted to see how big a black bear is.
guess I’m never going to Antarctica!
edit: okay we got ANOTHER TIL. Apparently polar bears don’t live in Antarctica!
…I need to watch more nature documentaries…
They’re northern Hemisphere, not Antarctica. We have them in our province (Manitoba), but yes they’re big. On average tho not quite as big as the painting there shows.
This would be a female bear, as she is with her cubs. Polar bears are actually the second most sexually dimorphic mammal. Consequently males are vastly bigger than females.
The most sexually dimorphic? The elephant seal. Those dudes are immense.
Edit: this, I read on wikipedia a couple of years ago. The information is no longer there but the fact that polar bears and elephant seals are among the most dimorphic mammals remains. The precise ranking is perhaps a little more obscure. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polar_bear
Third sentence of the first paragraph mentions sexual dimorphism, at least in the English version of the page. Mentioned a few more places too, so it’s still there.
Didn’t know that was a thing, that’s pretty cool!
I mean previously it stated that these were the two most dimorphic species. I’m guessing that due to the variance in body weight of the animals, it’s not that easy to say that they are more dimorphic than other species, because that depends upon the variable body mass of the animals. But it’s certainly a notable quality of polar bears and elephant seals that there can be such a huge difference, even if that difference grows and shrinks at different times of year.
I knew it! Seeing them in a Zoo many years back I got the impression they were pretty big but not THAT massive.
I think the painting shows the largest they’ve found, not the norm. It’s like showing Robert Wadlow (The tallest guy in the world at 8 ft 11.1 in (2.72 m) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Wadlow) to show the size of humans. Yes we can get that large, but it’s an extreme example.
Just let it happen. If someone is looking at my stat sheet Im not going to complain if they say I can run 100 meters as fast as Bolt did in the Olympics. *limps to the kitchen…
If one of the average sized ones rises up in front of you and roars, I bet it would look just as big as that painting.
Can anyone confirm? Probably not.
Yup, Not many people get the opportunity to see one up close and live to tell about it, unless there’s something REALLY solid in between them. Like that Nat Geo guy in the cage. https://youtu.be/U-S4NbX5IYE They’re absolutely terrifying up close…
They don’t typically roar tho, unless they’re fighting or f…uh screwing. And they’re not scared of anything.
They just seem to calmly creep where you are, and then start eating you, really. Their normal prey is seals etc., that do not fight back but flee, so their hunting tactic is to be sneaky, on top of not really having any natural predators (the no fear -reason). And you are just a thin seal, that does not know how to flee under the ice.
Pretty much, if you let them know you’re there you’re just making more work for yourself when you gotta chase them down.
I prefer quick meals too over having to waste time and effort lol! I’d just prefer to stay off the menu.
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