Way of life

Brown bears are solitary animals, except during mating season, and tend to roam through a defined territory. In the wild, bears wild grow to an age of between 25 and 30 years. Bears are omnivorous, although only a fifth of their diet consists of meat (such as small rodents, birds, frogs or snakes), fish or carrion. The remaining eighty percent of a bear's diet consists of bark, leaves, roots, mushrooms, nuts, fruit and berries. A rare but popular treat is honey, which serves to strengthen the immune system, among other things. The bears deftly open the hive using their claws, and are not put off by attacking bees.

Bears spend up to sixteen hours a day looking for food, primarily at dawn, in the evening and at night. Their movement tends to be comfortable and slow, but bears can reach speeds of up to fifty kilometres an hour for short periods if necessary. Bears frequently cover distances of about forty kilometres a day.

As bears are good swimmers, they have no problems crossing rivers. They are also good at fishing, catapulting the fish out of the water with their paws before catching and eating it.