Size

[brobear]

I learned that when you read in any animal book and see a number written as the "average weight" of a grizzly - forget you ever read it. There is no such animal as the average grizzly. When Park Rangers weigh bears, they take measurements and weights of animals randomly darted for the research. They do not undertake the time-consuming task of seeking out the big dominant males. Any bear ranging from 4 to 5 years old, which is sexually mature, is added into their averages as adult bears. Yet, a male grizzly is not truly a full-grown bear until he is about 10 years old. Younger bears spend their lives hiding from these mature monarch's of the wilderness. Adding the weights of those younger bears is no different than if, in a study of the weight of the average man, 11 and 12 year old boys are included in the study.
Another factor is the season. In the spring months, grizzly bears are at their lightest weight due to their long winter sleep. In the autumn, bears are extra-heavy due to fattening up for their winter sleep. So, the right time to weigh a grizzly is during the summer months.
Another factor is environment and food availability. Grizzlies that live in remote desert-like environments where foodstuffs is scarse are much smaller than their brothers who live near the coast and feast on salmon. Grizzly bears of such desolate locations normally weigh within the 300 pound range while coastal brown bears can weigh from 800 to well above 1,000 pounds. 
 

[brobear]

The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson - page 241 - The Big Skull by Grancel Fitz.
In the case of bears, it wasn't hard to find. The world's record grizzly skull is in the National Museum in Washington. The measurements of skulls give us the only accurate basis for comparison, and it is worth noting that this one was inaccurately reported for the last edition of the records. When the figures were found to vary from those on the same bear in earlier editions, the Washington authorities made a careful recheck. The length of that skull is 16 inches. The width is 9 and nine sixteenths. Combining these gives the record "score" of 25 and nine sixteenths. But far more important is the fact that this bear was shot near the Missouri River in Montana, away back in 1890, and it is highly significant that E.S. Cameron bagged him as early as the 4th of April. Since bears live for 40 years or more, unless somebody shoots them, and since they keep on getting bigger until they die, it is a fairly safe bet that this old monster was born in the great days of the bison, at least a century ago.

With the passing of the bison and the settling of the plains, all this was changed. Those huge old buffalo-eaters turned to killing cattle, and were wiped out by the ranchers. The grizzlies that survived were in the high mountain country, where the heavy snows and lack of winter feed forced them to hibernate for as much as six or seven months of the year. If a bear can eat only half of his life, and has to sleep throughout the rest, it just doesn't make sense that he can ever grow as big as one who is out and eating well for nine months, and hibernates for only three.

[brobear]

www.fieldandstream.com/blogs/fiel...ken-alaska

It’s official. Last Friday the Boone and Crockett club announced a grizzly bear taken by Larry Fitzgerald in 2013 near Fairbanks, Alaska will enter the record books as the largest ever taken by a hunter, and the second largest grizzly skull in the world.
Boone and Crockett collects data from trophy animals either found or harvested by hunters to help gauge wildlife management practices. A press release from the organization says it ranks bears according to skull size and Fitzgerald’s bear measured 27 6/16 inches—just 7/16 of an inch smaller than the reigning world-record skull found in Alaska in 1976.
“One would think that a relatively accessible area, with liberal bear hunting regulations to keep populations in line with available habitat and food, would be the last place to find one of the largest grizzly bears on record,” said Richard Hale, chairman of the Boone and Crockett Club's Records of North American Big Game committee.
Hale said the Alaska Department of Fish and Game liberalized hunting regulations in the area Fitzgerald hunted to help manage an overpopulation of grizzlies, and while baiting is legal, Fitzgerald stalked his bear after spotting it during a moose hunt.
"Grizzly populations are doing well across all their ranges. That includes populations in the Lower 48 states that are currently federally protected under the Endangered Species Act, but will soon be up for delisting and management authority turned over to the watchful eye of state wildlife managers," said Hale.

[brobear]

The Works of Theodore Roosevelt - volume 4 of 14.

The whole thing was over in twenty seconds from the time I caught sight of the game; indeed, it was over so quickly that the grisly did not have time to show fight at all or come a step toward us. It was the first I had ever seen, and I felt not a little proud, as I stood over the great brindled bulk, which lay stretched out at length in the cool shade of the evergreens. He was a monstrous fellow, much larger than any I have seen since, whether alive or brought in dead by the hunters. As near as we could estimate ( for of course we had nothing with which to weigh more than very small portions ) he must have weighed about twelve hundred pounds, and though this is not as large as some of his kind are said to grow in California, it is yet a very unusual size for a bear. He was a good deal heavier than any of our horses; and it was with greatest difficulty that we were able to skin him. He must have been very old, his teeth and claws being all worn down and blunted; but nevertheless he had been living in plenty, for he was as fat as a prize hog, the layers on his back being a finger's length in thickness. He was still in the summer coat, his hair being short, and in color a curious brindled brown, somewhat like that of certain bulldogs, while all the bears we shot afterward had the long winter fur, cinnamon or yellowish brown. By the way, the name of this bear has reference to its character and not to its color, and should, I suppose, be properly spelt grisly - in the sense of horrible, exactly as we speak of a "grisly spectre" - and not grizzly; but perhaps the latter way of spelling it is too well established to be now changed.

[brobear]

The Bear Almanac by Gary Brown.

Northern Montana, near Choteau: In May 2007 a 750-pound male grizzly bear was trapped ( for research ). Also very large for the spring, the bear, if it had gained normal weight, again considering its habitat and time of year, would have weighed 900 pounds by fall. With a length of 7 feet, 6 inches, 3.5 inch claws, and a 4-foot neck circumference, the bear is the second-largest grizzly recorded in the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem. 
 

The Grizzly Almanac by Robert H. Busch.

Perhaps the most colorful taxonomic description of all came from biologist Theodore Walker, who once said that "the grizzly, of course, is nothing more than an underfed Alaskan brown bear."

[brobear]

The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson.

San Francisco was aswarm with odd characters and filled with strange sites during the second half of the last century; nothing seemed capable of surprising its citizenry much. Yet when in the fall of 1856, a tall, gray-bearded man took to strolling down the streets with a grizzly bear or two trailing at his heels like obedient dogs, the free-wheeling city took immediate notice. They soon learned that the man's name was James Adams, and they began to flock to a dingy basement on Clay Street where he exhibited chained grizzlies and elk in a stall, as well as wolves, foxes, cougars, and other wild creatures. The most imposing resident of the menagerie was Samson, a 1,510 pound grizzly which Adams billed as the largest bear ever caught.

A Solitary Beast by Michael Jenkinson.

[brobear]

The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson - A Gallery of outlaw Grizzlies by W.P.Hubbard - Old Mose 1882 - 1904.

Ranchers living in the Black Mountain country near Canon City never tire of telling stories of Old Mose, a grizzly bear killed on Waugh Mountain near the Stirrup Ranch.

Old Mose roamed the stockmen's land, tore down their fences, killed thousands of dollars' worth of cattle and even killed their friend. He was credited with being one of the largest grizzlies ever killed in the Rocky Mountains.

J.W.Anthony of Indiana killed the bear April 30th, 1904. He owned a pack of thirty well-trained bear dogs. He was visiting at the Stirrup Ranch then owned by the late Wharton H. Pigg.

Killed shortly after coming out of hibernation, Old Mose was not as heavy as he was known to have been in other seasons. At that, he weighed 875 pounds, hog dressed. A clipping from the Canon City Record at that time says: "The skin of Old Mose measures ten feet four inches in length and nine feet across the shoulders."

[brobear]

The Grizzly Book by Jack Samson - The Trouble with Grizzlies by Thomas Hardin.

The grizzly is by no means as large as his cousin the monster brown bear of Kodiak Island or the Alaskan Peninsula, which sometimes is reputed to weigh 1,500 pounds. Now and then a wild grizzly may weigh 1,000 pounds and I have seen one that I thought would weigh between 850 and 900, but the average big male will weigh from 500 to 600 pounds and the females from 300 to 400. A hide that will square eight feet is a very large one, and one that will square nine feet is tremendous. The average big grizzly's hide will square about seven feet.

[brobear]

California Grizzly by Tracy I. Storer and Lloyd P. Tevis, Jr.

WEIGHT - The weight of California grizzlies is a topic on which there are many statements and some estimates but few facts. We have found fully fifty references on the subject, including a few precise figures. Some state that the animal was actually weighed, but other "weights" are sheer guesses. We know that the new-born grizzly was a relatively tiny creature, weighing less than two pounds; and we can be certain that some individuals attained to huge size - excluding exaggerations, there is adequate testimony on this point. The weight on any individual would depend on its age, sex, state of health, and nutrition, and possibly on the season of capture. The grizzly evidently had a growing period that lasted for several years. Data on grizzlies elsewhere indicate that males attain a larger size than females. It is possible that some grizzlies in California lived in places where a greater food supply was available than in other localities; and seasonal food supplies may have caused grizzlies to be fatter at certain times of year, such as after the acorn harvest. Data are lacking, however, on all these variables.

The two extreme statements we have found in regard to weights of California bears are these: "a young grizzly, weighing some eighty pounds" ( Oct.4, 1866; N 67 ) and "the bear tipped the beam-forbid it that anyone should question the reading of the scales! - at two thousand, three hundred and fifty pounds" ( Newmark, 1926 : 447 ).

The last captive, "Monarch" ( fig. 33 ), when killed after a long life in a public zoo where he was underexercised and probably overfed, weighed 1,127 pounds ( Grinnell et al., 1937 : 89 ). Adams' big captive, "Samson," was several times reported to weigh more than 1,500 pounds ( Hittell, 1860 : 295 ). One report of 1856 ( Herrick, 1946 : 179 ) states that a "mammoth grizzly," taken in what is now El Dorado County, afforded no less than 1,100 pounds of meat ( which yielded the hunter $1,375 ). Of two killed in the hills near Matilija Canyon, Ventura County, in September, 1882, it was stated: "The largest ... would weigh about 1,500 pounds; it was all two strong horses could do to drag it..." ( N 93 ).

Our records of animals with weights below 1,000 pounds, mainly from early newspapers, are as follows: 250 pounds, one; 300 pounds, two; 500 - 525 pounds, four; 630 - 642 pounds, three; 700 - 800 pounds, four; 900 - 932 pounds, four. The few weights not given in round numbers may indicate that they were of bears actually weighed. There are fully fifteen statements in early newspapers and a dozen or more in books, of weights of "1,000 pounds" and upward, practically all in round numbers.

The maximum weight of male California grizzlies was estimated at 1,200 pounds by Grinnell ( 1938 : 72 ) and by Hall ( 1939 : 238 ), neither of whom had access to the numerous reports we have found on the subject. We are inclined to believe that the maximum was somewhat higher. Seton ( 1909 : 1032 ) was of the opinion that no true grizzly ever weighed 1,500 pounds or that any but the California grizzly reached 1,000 pounds; he gave 600 pounds as the average weight for males, and 500 for females.

Writing from Colorado of the bears there, Mills ( 1919 : 251 - 252 ) said: The grizzly always appears larger than he really is. The average weight is between three hundred and fifty and six hundred pounds; males weigh a fourth more than females. Few grizzlies weigh more than seven hundred pounds, though exceptional specimens are known to have weighed more than one thousand ... It may be that years ago, when not so closely hunted, the grizzly lived longer and grew to a larger size ...

[brobear]

A 4.75 inches lower canine of a Cave bear, so its upper canine must have been an inch longer.

This bear could have a skull that exceeds 21 inches for sure. ( from post #32 by Grizzly Claws )

Largest Boone and Crockett Skulls:

Alaskan Brown Bear: Length 19 and 13/16 ... Width 17 and 14/16 ... Total Score 30 and 12/16.

Polar Bear: Length 18 and 8/16 ... Width 11 and 7/16 ... Total Score 29 and 15/16.

From shaggygod.proboards.com/ the record total of the Kamchatka brown bear: 30 and 11/16.

[brobear]

The record short-faced bear skull, from the biggest Arctodus simus specimen ever discovered, measures 20.51 inches. The record brown bear skull, that of a Kodiak, measures 19 and thirteen sixteeths inches long. The length difference is less than one inch.
However, the skull of Arctodus simus would of course be much wider and heavier.

[brobear]

Man Meets Grizzly by Young and Beyers.
This member of the great bear family continues to grow larger and stronger until he reaches maturity, in the seventh or eighth year. At that time he varies in size from four hundred to one thousand pounds. A grizzly bear at the Chicago zoo was weighed at 1,153 pounds. The biographer of James Capen Adams says that Adam's Old Sampson tipped the hayscales at 1,500 pounds. Many hunters have estimated grizzlies they have killed to weigh from one thousand to one ton; but a bear may look very large to a man out in the wilds.
Much has been written concerning the size of grizzlies. It was long a custom of mountaineers and hunters to speak of the size of bears in terms of the size of their tracks. Enos Mills gave the measurements of the largest grizzly track he had seen as slightly more than thirteen inches long and seven and a half inches wide. This length did not include the claws, which are sometimes seven inches long. Townsend's grizzly had a lateral footspan of ten inches and claws of seven inches. Than Galloway measured the foot of a Colorado grizzly at a little more than fourteen inches. Yet, tracks do not always indicate the size of a bear, any more than footprints do the size of a man.
There have in fact been many huge grizzlies. Than Galloway, the Utah bear hunter, reported killing one so large that it's skin, when stretched to dry, covered one end of a good-sized cabin. A bear is measured from the tip of the nose to the root of the tail; not that it would do much good to measure to the end of the tail, for this appendage is notoriously short. Despite the size of its tail, the grizzly is commonly a large bear, and many of the stories in this collection comment on its great size. An interesting footnote to the tale of Old Ephraim is that when his skull was presented to the Smithsonian Institution by the Boy Scouts of Cache Valley, the year following his death, the curator reported that it was the largest grizzly specimen they had had an opportunity to examine - a statement that the Smithsonian recently confirmed.

[brobear]

Bears of the World by Lance Craighead.

These tundra or barren-ground grizzly bears hibernate for 7 to 8 months and have only 4 or 5 months to accumulate fat reserves.

*Note; this fact coupled with the scarcity of food available explains the small size of this grizzly population.

[brobear]

The California Grizzly - bear in mind - from the collections of the Bancroft Library:

On a poster pictured in this book by P.T. Barnum: Great California Bear!! - Weighing 1988 Pounds! Standing 4 feet 6 inches in height; girth 4 feet around the neck, 7 feet around the body; and 14 inches between the ears. The Biggest Bear in America!

*Note: P.T. Barnum also claimed to have the world's biggest elephant, "Jumbo" and the world's biggest gorilla, "Gargantua."

[brobear]

Brown Bears by Melissa Gish.

The largest brown bear ever, a 2,130-pound ( 966 kg ) Kodiak named Clyde, died at the Dakota Zoo in Bismarck, North Dakota, in 1987.
According to zoo director Terry Lincoln, Clyde probably weighed close to 2400 lbs a year earlier He still had a fat layer of 9 inches when he died.

*Note: possibly true.

[brobear]

The Grizzly by Enos A. Mills.

The grizzly always appears larger than he really is. The average weight is between three hundred and fifty to six hundred pounds; males weigh a fourth more than females. Few grizzlies weigh more than seven hundred pounds, though exceptional specimens are known to have weighed more than one thousand. Adams gave the weight of "Samson," a California grizzly, as fifteen hundred pounds, and a few Alaskan grizzlies, judging by their skins, may have weighed more than "Samson." It may be that years ago, when not so closely hunted, the grizzly lived longer and grew to a larger size than he attains today.

[brobear]

The Grizzly by Enos A. Mills.

The largest grizzly track that I have measured was slightly more than thirteen inches long, and seven and one half inches wide at the widest point. These measurements did not include the clawmarks. In places where the bear had slipped on snowy or muddy ground the track with clawmarks was of most formidable appearance. Many of the big Alaskan grizzlies have large feet, sometimes making a track eighteen inches in length. However, in the Rocky Mountains I have seen a large track that had been made by a comparatively small bear. More than once I have seen bears weighing less than four hundred pounds whose feet were larger than those of other bears who weighed upwards of six hundred pounds. A large grizzly bear track does not necessarily indicate that it is the track of a large bear.

[brobear]

Yellowstone Bears in the Wild by James C. Halfpenny.

Size and Sensibility - Size counts.
My bear is bigger than your bear! Perhaps size is the most common topic for bear watchers. It is certainly a cause for bragging rights. Of course, bear size depends on where you are and who is telling the story. Famed naturalist Adolph Murie long ago noted that the biggest bears were always furthest away from any scales. In the Yellowstone area, bears are always biggest at the K-Bar Saloon in Gardiner.
Many people wonder if half-ton grizzlies roam the GYE. Paul Schullery noted historian and above all ursophile, reported in 'The Bears of Yellowstone' that on July 9, 1870, Bart Henderson shot a large grizzly near Cooke City. According to Bart's story, "We was attacked by an old boar bear. We soon killed him. He proved to be the largestever killed in the mountains, weighing 960 pounds." Paul notes that we do not know how, or really if, the bear was weighed.
I am only going to consider bears that were actually weighed or had their weights carefully estimated by chest girth measurements - no stories, no tales, no matter how good.
The heaviest Yellowstone grizzly "with documentation" that I know of was killed in 1916 near Old Faithful by Arthur Young for an exhibit in the California Academy of Science in San Francisco. When weighed in sections, the animal totaled 916 pounds. Dr. Saxton Pope, who also shot at the bear, estimated that 10 percent of the bear's live weight may have been lost as blood and waste during processing. If true, the bear weighed about 1,000 pounds. The bear was shot in May and reportedly had no fat left over after hibernation. How accurate were the scales in 1916? It should be noted that this bear was probably feeding at a garbage dump.
Then there is the legend of the Thousand Pound Bear named "Bruno" ( grizzly number 14 ), studied by the Craighead brothers. The heaviest recorded weight for Bruno was 890 pounds when live-trapped on September 5. Since the brothers figured he would put on additional weight before hibernation, Bruno was nicknamed the Thousand Pound Bear, even though he wasn't.
The Craigheads also trapped Fidel ( grizzly number 206 ), which weighed 800 pounds, No. 115 which weighed 660 pounds, No. 13 which weighed 645 pounds, and Ingemar ( No 12 ) which weighed 620 pounds. All were males. They also reported the average weight of grizzly bears contending for top leadership at the Trout Creek garbage dump was 575 pounds. All weights were taken in June or July. ( In some accounts referring to the Craighead research there are reports of a 1,120 pound ( or 500 kg ) grizzly bear. I have not been able to find such a bear in any of their scientific articles.

[brobear]

The Bear Almanac by Gary Brown.

"... the largest predators ( polar bears ) that stalk the earth," writes Charles Feazel in 'White Bear'. "If he wishes Nanook could slap a giraffe in the face."

"Of all the bears in the world, the Kodiak is the largest," according to Pat Cherr in 'The Bear in Fact and Fiction'. "He is the largest land-dwelling flesh-eater in the world."

"Polar bears are the largest of the North American bears," according to Peter Clarkson and Linda Sutterlin in 'Bear Essentials'.

"A full-grown Alaskan brown bear is the most impressive wild animal on this continent," relates Clyde Ormand in his 'Complete Book of Hunting'. "The Alaskan brown bear ( Ursus ) has for decades been considered North America's largest carnivore..."

"As to maximum body size probably the polar bear exceeds the coastal brownie," according to bear hunting guide Duncan Gilchrist in 'All about Bears'. "A lifesize white bear may indeed be the world's most impressive mount."

"There is little question," according to Ben East in 'Bears', "that on the average the brown bear is the biggest land carnivore left on earth."

"Polar bears," writes Terry Domico in 'Bears of the World', "are among the largest members of the bear family."

"On Alaskan islands and in Siberia," write Paul Shepard and Barry Sanders in 'The Sacred Paw', "the brown bear vies with the polar bear as the largest predatory land mammal..."

"Judged by skull size, the yardstick the Boone and Crockett Club uses in scoring trophy bears, the polar does not quite equal the brown, for the reason that his more slender head counts against him," notes Ben East. "In weight he rivals the giant brown bear of Alaska. Perhaps the greatest difference between the sea bear and the land bears is in his ( polar bear's ) looks."

"... the bear that most sportsmen call the Kodiak, the biggest bear on earth and also the biggest land carnivore," writes Ben East in 'The Ben East Hunting Book'.

"The polar bear," writes Frederick Drimmer in 'The Animal Kingdom', is one of the largest carnivorous animals in the world, narrowly surpassed by the gigantic Alaskan brown bear.

[brobear]

The Great Bear Almanac by Gary Brown.

The Boone and Crockett system described in chapter 6 scores the bears accordingly. This is a tangible means of size comparison, but not totally indicative of total size, as individual variations occur. For example, a large, heavy bear may have a small, short, or narrow skull, providing it with a total skull size unrepresentative of its overall body size.