Plionarctos
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Plionarctos Temporal range: late Miocene–Pleistocene |
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|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Carnivora |
| Suborder: | Caniformia |
| Superfamily: | Arctoidea |
| Family: | Ursidae |
| Subfamily: | Tremarctinae |
| Genus: |
†Plionarctos Frick, 1926 |
| Type species | |
| †Plionarctos edensis Frick, 1926 |
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| Species | |
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†P. harroldorum (Tedfored & Martin, 2001) |
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†P. harroldorum (Tedfored & Martin, 2001)
†P. edensis (Frick, 1926)
Plionarctos is an extinct genus of mammals of the family Ursidae (bears) endemic to North America and Europe during Miocene through , living from ~10.3—3.3 Mya, existing for about 7 million years.
Indarctos (10.7—9.2 Mya) preceded Plionarctos by only a few thousand years and was a contemporary of that bear and shared its habitat. Plionarctus preceded and was also contemporary with Tremarctos floridanus (4.9 million — 11,000 years ago) and shared its habitat.
Plionarctos is the oldest known genus within the subfamily of the short-faced bears (Tremarctinae) endemic to the Americas, and is believed to be ancestral to the clade.
Plionarctos was named by Frick (1926). Its type is Plionarctos edensis. It was assigned to Ursidae by Frick (1926) and Carroll (1988); and to Tremarctini by Hunt (1998).
Two specimens were examined by Legendre and Roth for body mass.
Sites and specimen ages:
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Wikipedia