Spectacled Bear

## Here's looking at you

The Andean bear of South America is also known as the spectacled bear for the rings of white or light fur around its eyes, which can look like eyeglasses (or spectacles) against the rest of the bear’s black or dark brown fur. These markings often extend down the chest, giving each bear a unique appearance and helping researchers identify each bear by its "mug shot"! The markings also give the bear its scientific name: Tremarctos ornatus, or decorated bear.

As a mid-sized bear species, Andean bears are between four and six feet long and stand 2 to 3 feet at the shoulder. Males are 30 to 50 percent larger than the females.

## At home in the trees

Normally diurnal, very little is known about these bears in the wild, as they are shy and tend to avoid humans, making them hard to find for researchers to study! The bears are native to the Andean countries from Venezuela to Bolivia, living in forests, grasslands, and scrublands.

Andean bears are true arboreal bears, using their long, sharp front claws to climb and forage for food. They build leafy platforms in the trees, both in the wild and in zoos, which they may use to feed and sleep. Because of their tropical native climate, Andean bears do not hibernate and are active year-round. Their biggest threats come from humans, directly or indirectly.

## I'll eat that!

Andean bears are mainly plant eaters, dining on fruit, bromeliads, and palms, and are the most vegetarian members of the bear family, aside from the bamboo-eating giant panda. Those living in scrubland habitat are even known to eat cacti! Farmers sometimes blame Andean bears for killing livestock, but studies of the bears' droppings (scat) show that only around five percent of their diet is meat, usually rodents and insects. The bears are good swimmers, although they don't usually dine on fish!

Mostly solitary, Andean bears may gather together to eat where food is plentiful, such as a cluster of trees bearing fruit or corn ripening in a farmer's field. Eating so much fruit helps these bears play an important role in forest ecology: the seeds they eat are excreted in their droppings as the bears move around, spreading the seeds over long distances for the production of the next generation of fruit trees throughout the forest.

At the San Diego Zoo, the Andean bears are fed biscuits made for zoo omnivores, apples, carrots, grapes, yams, bananas, oranges, and lettuce. For treats they may be offered crickets and mealworms.

## Bear talk

Andean bears are thought to use vocal communication more than any other bear except the giant panda. They make unique vocalizations that are quite "un-bear-like": a shrill screech and a soft, purring sound. Mother bears may use different vocalizations to communicate with their cubs.

## Family life

A female gives birth to one to three cubs in a protected, out-of-the-way den, but almost nothing is known about how she chooses her den site, which is thought to be a nest made under tree roots or rocks. The newborns’ eyes don't open until they are about 42 days old. Cubs first leave the safety of the den when they are about three months old. They can ride on the mother’s back, or she can carry a cub by clutching it to her chest with one front paw as she runs on three legs or walks on her hind legs!

It is not known how long the youngsters stay with their mother in the wild, but it is believed that the cubs are at least one year old when they venture out on their own.