Mexican Grizzly

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Mexican Grizzly
Conservation status
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Carnivora
Family: Ursidae
Genus: Ursus
Species: U. arctos
Subspecies: U. arctos nelsoni
Trinomial name
Ursus arctos nelsoni
Merriam, 1914
Synonyms

Ursus horribilis nelsoni

The Mexican Grizzly (Ursus arctos nelsoni) is a presumed extinct subspecies of the Brown bear. It is named after American naturalist Edward William Nelson who shot the holotype near Chihuahua in 1899.

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[edit] Description

The Mexican Grizzly was one of the heaviest and largest mammals in Mexico. It reached a length up to 183 centimetres and an average weight of 318 kilograms. Due to its silver fur it was named "el oso plateado = the silvery" by the natives.

[edit] Range and Habitat

The Mexican Grizzly inhabited the northern territories of Mexico in particular the temperate grasslands and mountainous pine forests. Its previous range reached from Arizona to New Mexico and Mexico.

[edit] Biology

Its diet consisted mainly on plants, fruits and insects. Occasionally it fed also from small mammals and carrion. One to three cubs were born all three years.

[edit] Extinction

The first Europeans which came in contact with the Mexican Grizzly were the conquistadors in the 16th century when Francisco Vásquez de Coronado went on an expedition to find the Seven Cities of Gold. His trudge began in Mexico City in 1540 and went north to New Mexico and the Buffalo Plains in Texas and Kansas. Because the bears preyed on livestock from time to time they were considered a pest by the farmers. The Mexican Grizzly was trapped, shot and poisoned, and had already become scarce in the 1930s. Its former range decreased to the three isolated mountains Cerro Campano, Santa Clara, and Sierra del Nido 80 km north of Chihuahua in the state of Chihuahua. By 1960 only 30 individuals were left. Despite its protected status the hunting continued. By 1964 the Mexican Grizzly bear was regarded as extinct. After an alleged report of some individuals on a ranch at the headwaters of the Yaqui River in the Sonora province in 1969 American biologist Dr. Carl B. Koford went on a three-month survey but without success.

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