Osteichthyes - Carnivora - Ursidae
PaleoDB taxon number: 52609
Alternative combination: Thalarctos maritimus
Synonyms: Thalarctos polaris Gray 1825 (no. 105077), Ursus marinus Pallas 1776 (no. 183192), Ursus polaris Shaw 1792 (no. 183193)
Belongs to Ursus according to S. Larivière 2001
See also Alroy 2002, DeMaster and Stirling 1981, Ewer 1973, Kurten 1964, Kurten 1968, Kurten and Anderson 1980 and Waits et al. 1999
Sister taxa: Ursus abstrusus, Ursus americanus, Ursus arctos, Ursus arvernensis, Ursus deningeri, Ursus dentrificius, Ursus etruscus, Ursus inopinatus, Ursus malayanus, Ursus minimus, Ursus praemalayanus, Ursus priscus, Ursus spelaeus, Ursus thibetanus, Thalassarctos spitzbergensis, Thalassarctos eogroenlandicus, Thalassarctos labradorensis, Thalassarctos jenaensis, Euarctos optimus, Ursus (Euarctos) vitabilis
Subtaxa: Ursus maritimus maritimus, Ursus maritimus tyrannus
Ecology: amphibious carnivore-omnivore
Environments: marine (10 collections), terrestrial (5), marginal marine (2), coastal (1)
Average measurements (in mm): femur length 423.1, femur diameter 27.3, humerus length 349.9, humerus diameter 34.4, radius length 283.5, radius diameter 18.6, scapula length 215.0, tibia length 306.2, tibia diameter 26.0, ulna length 325.0
Estimated body mass: 125.6 kg based on femur diameter, femur length, humerus diameter, humerus length, tibia diameter, tibia length, and ulna length
Age range: 1.806 to 0.0 Ma
Distribution:
• Quaternary of Canada (11: Northwest Territories, Nunavut, Yukon collections), Denmark (2), Germany (1), Greenland (10), Norway (3), the Russian Federation (3), Svalbard and Jan Mayen (1), Sweden (3), the United Kingdom (1), United States (11: Alaska)
Total: 46 collections each including a single occurrence