Cave bear
(Ursus spelaeus)
The cave bear (Ursus spelaeus) is a prehistoric species of bear which lived in Europe and Asia during the Pleistocene epoch, around 100,000 to 24,000 years ago. They had very broad, domed skulls with a steeped forhead and a similar skeletal structure to the modern day brown bear. They were compariable in size (or larger than) the largest modern day bears, measuring up to 2 meters in length and weighing up to 1000kg. Despite their enourmous size, they are thought to have been mostly herbiverous.
Cave bears are thought to have spent more time in caves than the modern day brown bear, which uses caves only for hibernation. Therefore it's not surprising that many caves in Central Europe contain cave bear fossils.
Did you know?
Cave bear bones are so numerous in some caves in central Europe that during World War I, with a scarcity of phosphate dung, the earth from these caves was used as a source of phosphates. Some caves are known to contain thousands of bones which likely accumilated over a period of 100,000 years or more.