11 Facts About Sun bear

Sun bear is a species in the family Ursidae occurring in the tropical forests of Southeast Asia.

Range of the sun bear is bound by northeastern India to the north and extends south to southeast through Bangladesh, Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam in mainland Asia to Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia to the south.

Sun bear is named so for its characteristic orange to cream coloured, crescent-like chest patch.

In 1906, Richard Lydekker proposed another subspecies by the name H m wardii for a sun bear skull, noting its similarities to a skull from Tibet with a thicker coat; however the Tibetan specimen was later found to be an Asian black bear.

Nuclear gene sequencing of bear species revealed that the sloth bear and the sun bear were the first Ursinae bears that radiated and are not included in the monophyletic Ursus group; moreover, all relationships between the bears were well resolved.

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The sun bear is an excellent climber; it sunbathes or sleeps in trees 2 to 7 metres above the ground.

In one incident, a tiger-sun bear interaction resulted in a prolonged altercation and in the death of both animals.

Sun bear is native to the tropical forests of Southeast Asia; its range is bound by northeastern India to the north and extends south to Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam to Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia to the south.

Sun bear tends to avoid heavily logged forests and areas close to human settlement.

Sun bear populations appear to decrease in size northward from Sundaland, and numbers are especially low in the northern and western extremes of the range.

Sun bear is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, and is included in CITES Appendix I With the exception of Sarawak and Cambodia, the sun bear is legally protected from hunting in its whole range.