Big Bear Sloth Bear

Hello lovely readers, I hope you all enjoyed the festival of colors, do share your unique experience with me here on the blog. Being a Sunday I opened my jungle book (my DSLR world) to check what can I offer you today, on referring picture portfolio I realized that animal write up is pending from some time as we have gone through trip report or birds on large scale. While I was thinking word jungle book it reminds me of some characters of Mowgli and then Baloo (Bhalu/Sloth Bear) clicked to my mind, so this is how we got the appointment of Baloo today. Let's meet Baloo closely in the next section.

Are you sure, I am Sloth?

How much we know about our own Baloo, only the extent of Mowgli’s world and nothing more hence, I take this opportunity to spread awareness about this cute and shy animal. The topic itself start with uniqueness, the heading is in question frame so let me answer the question which will help you to understand the story behind having such interesting name

Sloth bears are a bit misleading by name, the word sloth means lazy/unwillingness/slow moving mammal etc but sloth bears are not related to sloths, and they are not slow moving. In fact, they’re agile bears that can run faster than a human and will attack if surprised. It was a European zoologist, George Shaw, who named the sloth bear for its long, thick claws and unusual teeth. He thought that the bear was related to the tree sloth due to these features. Sloth bears sometimes hang upside down on tree branches, much like a tree sloth.

This animal is different in appearance and habits from other animals, it is very shy and run away if it notices any disturbance. It is difficult to capture in a photogenic frame as it hardly stops if it smells human presence. As I said it is different by habits as well so let's learn a few things related to habits and diets in the next section.

Extraordinaire Habits and Diets Habits:

Sloth bears adapt well to many different habitats. They live in the hot, dry grasslands and forests. You must be thinking if sloth bear likes hot and dry land how it is surviving with such coated body? Let me tell you in the wild everything is made by God in such a way that each thing has meaning to it. The coat protects them from being bitten by their favorite food—termites! It also gives sloth bear cubs something to grip when their mothers carry them on their backs. They often sleep in caves and near rivers when available. Sloth bears tend to be nocturnal when living around humans. But without human disturbance nearby, they are often active during the day. Now let us see what diet it takes.

Diets

The way they eat is interesting, Sloth bears feed predominantly on termites and ants and employs a well-evolved method to dig them out. Their long, curved claws are used for penetrating nest mounds, which can be rock-hard. Once they’ve opened a hole, they blow away excess dirt then noisily suck out the insects through a gap in their front teeth. To do so, they close their nostrils and use their lips like a vacuum nozzle. Apart from termites they also feed on a variety of fruit and flowers, including mango, fig, and ebony. They are also known to scale the occasional tree to knock down a bee honeycomb, which they will then enjoy on the ground below. It is this habit that’s given rise to their nickname, honey bears. One more thing for which bears are mad is Mahuwa flowers (Madhuca longifolia) they are crazy for Mahuwa flowers and hence you can sight them more frequently in MP forests during Mahuwa season.

I hope you enjoyed the basic details of our own Baloo since we all know about how it looks and all I will prefer to provide you some unknown facts of this lovely animal in the next section.

Fantastic facts

Sloth bears aren’t very vocal but can make an impressive roar if needed for defense. A mother with a cub clinging to her back was observed scaring off not one but two tigers with her roar! Recently a video of sloth bear fighting with a famous tiger of Tadoba went viral where sloth bear managed to defense and finally tiger had to move back. You can find the same on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bo2kHm8s2EY

The breeding season for sloth bears varies according to location: In India, they mate in April, May, and June, and give birth in December and early January. Litters usually consist of one or two cubs, or rarely three. Cubs are born blind and open their eyes after four weeks

The sloth bear often has a white patch of fur on its chest in the shape of a Y, O, or U. With a stocky body and powerful legs, this medium-size bear is able to climb trees. The sloth bear cannot pull in its claws like a cat's, so it looks a bit awkward when walking

Sloth bears tend to shuffle along slowly when walking but are able to run at speeds of around 40-50kph. However, they cannot maintain this pace for long

The animal is such a unique mammal that it is difficult to describe in limited words hence I opted to provide selective and interesting details only. While ending the blog I would like to through light on the conservation status of Sloth bear that needs urgent attention, please read facts pertaining to conservation and help us to save such an attractive mammal

Threats to Survival

Sloth bears are considered vulnerable animals. They are threatened by habitat loss and are sometimes captured for use in performances or hunted because of their aggressive behavior and destruction of crops. It is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, mainly because of habitat loss and degradation. There is urgent attention required to save this wonderful animal else we will be able to see them only in books