Have you ever seen the bear which has a half moon-shaped mark on its chest? Ursus thibetanus is a medium-sized and black bear, which is also called 'the Moon bear' and 'Asian black bear'. It has a large forehead and ears. It is usually compared with the brown bear of Eurasia due to their similar appearance, but ursus thibetanus is smaller than brown bear. Mature male is measured about 6 ft in body length in case. Its average weight is about 250 lbs. More than anything else, it has a white crescent mark, or V-shaped mark on its chest. That is why it is usually called 'the Moon bear'. Many people are fascinated by its charming chest mark. Koreans love it so much that the Korean government appointed it as a natural monument and have been protecting it carefully. But sadly, it is being endangered across the much of Asian, due to deforestation. Now only a few Asian tigers inhabit in Malaysia, North Korea, Japan, Siberia, northeastern China and the Russia far east. It is said that this Asian black bear is usually shy and cautious animal, but it is more aggressive toward humans than the brown bears of Eurasia. According to David W. Macdonald, "The Himalayan black bear is a savage animal, sometimes attacking without provocation, and inflicting horrible wounds, attacking generally the head and face with their claws, while using their teeth also on a prostrate victim." (446). It is found that they are omnivorous, so they feed on insects, bees, eggs, fruits and oak. In South Korea, there are only 10 Asian black bears. Although they are loved all over the country, nothing can revive the dead Asian black bears. So the only thing we can do for even 10 bears left is to protect a forest where they live. It is not relevant to only Korea. To prevent letting these charming bears become extinct, the effort to protect a forest is needed earnestly.
Macdonald, David. The Encyclopedia of Mammals. London: Allen & Unwin, 1984.
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Taiwan have this kind of bear, too. They are so cute, but we only can see them in the zoo now. Taiwanese goverment started to pretect them and try to raise them although raise endangered animals are difficult to do. People still need to protect native animals.
ReplyDeleteMany animals need to protect them not only bear.
ReplyDeleteThis time many people of our class wrote topic about animals. Actually,i want to write topic about animals originally.
Korean government is really busy because they need to protect Korean squirrels, Jindo dogs, and moon bears. Always people start when they face the problem. It is too bad. I like moon bears because they are cute and look so friendly. I think most Korean like moon bears. I hope that Korean government try to protect rare animals and plants as well as people's welfare.
ReplyDeleteHi~Yumi~
ReplyDeleteHaha~ This is my second time to read this paragraph. Reading it again helps me understand it better.
ya..We only can see the animals which become extinct in the zoo. Hope we can see the rare animals in the wild in the future.