Tremarctinae Temporal range: late Miocene–present |
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A spectacled bear in Tennōji Zoo, Osaka. | |
Scientific classification | |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Mammalia |
Order: | Carnivora |
Suborder: | Caniformia |
Family: | Ursidae |
Subfamily: |
Tremarctinae Merriam & Stock, 1925 |
Genera | |
†Plionarctos
†Arctodus
†Arctotherium
Tremarctos
The Tremarctinae or short-faced bears is a subfamily of Ursidae that contains one living representative, the spectacled bear (Tremarctos ornatus) of South America, and several extinct species from four genera: the Florida spectacled bear (Tremarctos floridanus), the North American short-faced bears of genera Plionarctos (P. edensis and P. harroldorum) and Arctodus (A. pristinus and A. simus), and the South American giant short-faced bears of Arctotherium (including A. angustidens, A. vetustum, A. bonariense, A. wingei, and A. tarijense).
Traditionally the phylogenetic inner relationships of tremarctines had Plionarctos and Tremarctos being basal groups in respect to a short-faced bear clade of Arctodus and Arctotherium. A study of phylogenetic relationships of bears belonging to the genus Arctotherium, incidating that they were more closely related to the spectacled bear than to Arctodus.
The following taxonomy of the tremarctine bears follow by Mitchell et al. (2016):