White spots turn up occasionally on the chest of either color phase.
But black and brown aren't the only color schemes that the black bear is offered in. The blue bears have become increasingly rare because, it is thought, of interbreeding with the more common brown and black color phases. This bear was first described to science in 1905 by Dr. William Hornaday of the New York Zoo. He considered them a separate species and named them Ursus kermodei after a Canadian colleague, Francis Kermode, who had worked tirelessly to secure specimens and information. U. a. kermodei is only found in three small, isolated, pockets on the Pacific coast of British Columbia.