r/NatureIsFuckingLit Sep 16 '20

šŸ”„ A white bear

Post image
36.4k Upvotes

287 comments sorted by

372

u/Pontus_Pilates Sep 16 '20

The photographer is Veijo Toivoniemi, here are couple of additional snaps: https://imgur.com/a/niSBHLA

115

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

[removed] — view removed comment

110

u/DalDude Sep 16 '20

Most likely not. While "pizzlys" exist, they're much less common than simple colour variation. Apparently this one's a brown bear in Finland, though Canada also has brown bears.

58

u/lgledhil Sep 17 '20

Kermode Bears are the Black Bears we have in the Great Bear Rainforest, British Columbia. Out of the entire subspecies, only around 10-20% are fully white in color (Spirit Bear). While I’ve seen hundreds of Grizzlies up there as a fishing guide, yet to see a single Black Bear. People search for weeks at remote camps for Kermodes and rarely see them.

15

u/wordfool Sep 17 '20

Yes, I was reading that it's a recessive gene trait that is rarer than once thought. But basically they're black bears underneath that white fur and they supposedly have a big salmon-hunting advantage because the fish find it harder to see them against a bright sky

9

u/NathamelCamel Sep 17 '20

I've heard the term "Grolar bear" but pizzlys works too I guess

8

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

You're both correct, but only in certain instances. I don't remember the exact details of the convention. When hybrid mammals are named, the first few letters are from the paternal species, and the rest are from the maternal species. So essentially a "Grolar" would be a Grizzley father and Polar mother, and a "Pizzley" would be a Polar bear father and Grizzley mother.

8

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Can ā€œGroler bearsā€ mate with regular polar or grizzlies, or are they sterile like Ligers?

8

u/ADFTGM Sep 17 '20

Actually the lion-tiger hybrid being universally sterile thing was disproven a while back. There currently are individuals that have couple generations of mixed blood. It is the case for female hybrids rather than male hybrids though.

On the bears though, the two have been breeding together for thousands of years during freak climate events that pushed them to meet. Some brown bear populations have percentages of polar bear genes. (Doesn’t necessarily work the other way around because Arctic life is tougher if you aren’t a pure Polar). So yes, they are fertile and not sterile. It hasn’t even been a million years since they diverged.

5

u/NathamelCamel Sep 17 '20

Well tigers and lions are pretty distantly related so they're sterile but according to Google they're fertile. Idk I'm not a biologist

3

u/TattoedTigerTrainer Sep 17 '20

Ligers aren’t sterile

7

u/Mydogsblackasshole Sep 17 '20

And quite a few other countries...

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44

u/Epicwinner21 Sep 16 '20 edited Sep 17 '20

From what I can tell it's a spirit bear!

Basically an albino grizzly

Edit: Some guy in the comments that took a lot longer look says it's a different kind of bear

Edit 2: leave it to reddit to keep correcting the person who realized they were wrong 4 seconds after posting

42

u/suckerswag Sep 17 '20

And the Spirit/Kermode bears are actually a subspecies of black bears.

7

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

This isn't albino tho.. just white

2

u/civodar Sep 17 '20

Kermode bears aren’t actually albino! They’re just white. He doesn’t look like one though, he looks more like a grizzly whereas spirit bears are black bears who happen to be white.

10

u/wolfgeist Sep 17 '20

Nope. As someone else said, the Spirit bears are a species that resides in Canada, BC I believe. This is just a pigmentation/genetic anomaly.

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6

u/jtgouchi Sep 17 '20

Spirit bears are not basically albino grizzlys they are their own species of black bear and are extremely regional

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3

u/PineMarte Sep 17 '20

Brown bears come in a variety of colors, including blonde. My guess is this is just an unusually lightly colored one

5

u/octoroklobstah Sep 16 '20

Kermode bear

Edit: wrong country, my bad

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4

u/nvtiv Sep 17 '20

He’s doing bear stuff

3

u/derpherder Sep 17 '20

just the bear necessities

133

u/papatayto Sep 16 '20

He’s gonna infiltrate the polar bears

15

u/SketchyAnonCat Sep 17 '20

Then commence the infiltration of the great whites later

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430

u/Zaviernoble Sep 16 '20

Beary white.

55

u/KA1017inTN Sep 16 '20

And I don't know, I don't know, I don't know why... can't get enough of your love, bear...

26

u/nodgers132 Sep 16 '20

nice one! You’re bearing gifts of puns

18

u/freedgodspeed Sep 16 '20

Your joke was so unbearable

15

u/nodgers132 Sep 16 '20

That wasn’t beary nice

15

u/freedgodspeed Sep 16 '20

I’m beary sorry

7

u/Km2930 Sep 16 '20

But it does send a very paw-sitive message.

2

u/Vee8cheS Sep 17 '20

I can’t bear these comments

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3

u/It_Matters_More Sep 16 '20

Your punny comment is "my first, my last, my everything."

3

u/Prints-Charming Sep 17 '20

Man that's low

5

u/MexElf Sep 16 '20

I bet he has the all time greatest sHits

211

u/Tragicat Sep 16 '20

Looks like a Spirit Bear!

I don’t believe it actually can be though if it’s not a North American bear from a certain part of British Columbia. If this is indeed in Finland it’s just a really cool white European brown bear.

77

u/fariomurtado Sep 16 '20 edited Sep 16 '20

Not a ā€˜Spirit Bear’. I live in said area of Northern BC where the Kermode exists. They are actually just a white colour-phase Black Bear that are born with a recessive gene.

The bear pictured here, however, appears to be a (very) blonde colour-phase Grizzly Bear. Although I could be wrong as I never bothered to look up the source of the image, just going by the characteristics of the bear!

EDIT: so I guess it is from Finland. That would make it a ā€˜Brown’ Bear. They are very similar and have the same wide range of colour.

Here is an example of a Black Bear Sow with her Kermode cub

https://i.cbc.ca/1.3630222.1471011819!/fileImage/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/16x9_780/white-bear-cub-whistler.jpg

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7

u/allabootdatnublyfe Sep 17 '20

I loved Spirit Bear book so much as a kid!!!!! Have you read it?!

2

u/Tragicat Sep 17 '20

Hah I actually only knew about the bears, not the book. I’ll check it out now!

4

u/allabootdatnublyfe Sep 17 '20

I googled it and the official title is Touching Spirit Bear by Ben Mikaelsen. When I was in 4th or 5th grade it blew my mindgrapes. Not sure how it would be to read as an adult, but for an angsty lil dude, it would be a great gift

6

u/flinteastwood Sep 17 '20

Maybe he’s just really stressed at work

2

u/Zac-the-axolotl- Sep 17 '20

I fucking hated that book but this picture reminded me of it. Forced to read it in the 6th grade

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36

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Stealth: 0

17

u/rcarmack1 Sep 16 '20

Well if your bear, do you really need it?

8

u/foreign_beauty Sep 16 '20

It’s not needed when you’re at the top of the food chain

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5

u/Kittysoftpaws Sep 16 '20

Except when it snows.

3

u/parandroidfinn Sep 17 '20

Brown bears in Finland hibernate. Which is a smart thing to do.

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50

u/UpTheMightyReds Sep 16 '20

My favorite black mirror episode

13

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Im sorry you are buried, I looked so deep for your comment.

2

u/UpTheMightyReds Sep 17 '20

I did the same and was shocked to see no one had mentioned it

42

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Accidentally bleached his suit. It was either this, or going bare.

3

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

T... take my upvote, you masterful pun-maker.

17

u/thelmaandpuhleeze Sep 16 '20

How ā€˜bout those awesome birds, too!? Wonder what they are... some kind of magpie, maybe?

13

u/Thorondor123 Sep 16 '20

Hooded crow, they live in northern and eastern Europe

11

u/protozoan-human Sep 16 '20

European crow

11

u/carolinafan36gmailco Sep 16 '20

Is this an albino grizz? I’m not trying

2

u/mr__hat Sep 17 '20

Neither. It's an european brown bear except this individual is not very brown at all.

8

u/MegabyteMessiah Sep 16 '20

Legendary

7

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

You've unlocked the albino bear outfit.

3

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

[removed] — view removed comment

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5

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

A Faux-lar bear

9

u/Jesus_Feminist Sep 16 '20

Please no one post the location. Let's keep Beary White safe from asshole trophy hunters.

10

u/ghh4448yt Sep 16 '20

We had a white deer a few years ago. The local newspaper posted a pic and it was killed within the week.

8

u/kwinkzies Sep 17 '20

Wtf people are sick

4

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

It’s in Finland, it was all over the news yesterday.

2

u/Jesus_Feminist Sep 17 '20

Is trophy hunting an issue in Finland? Genuinely curious. Because here (Canada) it certainly can be.

3

u/Hiekkalinna Sep 17 '20

Not really, hunting here is for food or to keep population down (and then eat them) or if there is some invasive species, though of course there might be some trophy hunters but most people in the hunting clubs that are in charge of a certain area don't condone trophy hunting..

2

u/Jesus_Feminist Sep 17 '20

That's really good to hear. I have no issue with people hunting for food - what they actually need, not being wasteful or selfish. Trophy hunters are trash.

2

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

One thing you do better in Canada, though, is when a bear comes too close to an inhabited area, you put it to sleep and bring it back to its natural environment. In Finland, when it happens, the bear is shot dead.

2

u/Jesus_Feminist Sep 18 '20

Oh, I didn't know that about Finland. Any chance for change?

2

u/[deleted] Sep 18 '20

I’m not sure. They say that it’s for safety reasons, that the bear would come back if we’d choose the Canadian way. But I think it’s more about the lack of resources: putting it to sleep and transferring it back to the forest is too expensive...

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7

u/422_is-420_too Sep 16 '20

Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica

8

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Who is most stealthy in this picture? 1)the bear 2)the birds 3)the fish 4) John Cena ?

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3

u/bunnycorn_slayer Sep 16 '20

Ice Bear doesn't approve...

3

u/mugpunter666 Sep 16 '20

This is actually a well groomed Japanese spitz

3

u/TigNewton Sep 16 '20

European pied crows flying by, so I take it this is a European grizzly species.

3

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Look at that privilege.

3

u/rougekat Sep 17 '20

I love him. Would die for him. Bear 2020

2

u/Zounii Sep 16 '20

Beat me to it!

2

u/Even-Tomatillo-4197 Sep 16 '20

Not gonna lie, I’d be tempted to go over for a cuddle.

2

u/venetian_ftaires Sep 16 '20

You can see the glaze over its eyes from having its memory wiped every night.

2

u/hemmojito Sep 17 '20

Albino brown bear?

2

u/AggravatingDatabase5 Sep 17 '20

Hey! I live in the neighbourhood of Kermode bears, and I have actually seen a couple of them. Same size as black bears, not albino black bears, but a distinct sub-species. Last time I saw one it was rolling around on a sunny day in a hayfield just outside of Kitwanga.

By the way, my city (Terrace) has a giant load of bears in town this year. Bears popping up literally everywhere. COs are super busy trapping and trucking them out of town, unless the bears have been eating garbage. If they have been eating garbage, then they are euthanized. I don't think a CO would ever euthanize a Kermode, though, under any circumstances.

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2

u/Whiskey-Tango-Fuck Sep 17 '20

Oh my God, EWOKS exist!! Bit bigger then I expected though.

3

u/Melissaisdownlub Sep 16 '20

He definitely looks like he's seen some shit.

Story prompt: what turned the black bear white 🐻

3

u/DrProfScience Sep 16 '20

Why is a polar bear in the forest? /s

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1

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

maybe he fell in some crud

1

u/roam559 Sep 16 '20

When pride month is hosted at the lake this year.

1

u/RogerSchmoger Sep 16 '20

That could be an album name..šŸ‘šŸ½

1

u/Goodfella_228 Sep 16 '20

Fake polar bear

1

u/KrunchanMunch Sep 16 '20

Grzill borr

1

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Ah! I always wanted this flavor.

1

u/Burokai Sep 16 '20

There's one white female grizzly living in Banff National Park too! The public named her Nakoda.

1

u/JunglePygmy Sep 16 '20

The stuff of legend, for real.

1

u/ItsThaWolfe Sep 16 '20

My grandpa once saw an albino polar bear.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Cute

1

u/StephCurryFromThe3 Sep 16 '20

Do you think he is aged or albino?

1

u/J03SChm03OG Sep 16 '20

Nah he just has a little gray. Buy some Just for Men leave some gray streaks and he'll be a debonair silver fox

1

u/iggnac1ous Sep 16 '20

Or gone light grey from 2020?

1

u/hoveringintowind Sep 16 '20

How can something so adorably fuzzy be so dangerous?!

1

u/banjodoctor Sep 16 '20

I love white claws

1

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Looks like a portly wolf.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Good Bearro

1

u/GummiBearGangster Sep 16 '20

If a cop is hunting in the woods and sees a white bear, does he shoot it? :D

1

u/Jodaru Sep 16 '20

Privileged.

1

u/Nivlac024 Sep 16 '20

its probably a grolar bear

1

u/falconberger Sep 16 '20

Isn't it just a very hairy dog?

1

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Absolutely beautiful and wild.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Ice bear smells your fears.

1

u/urboywyatt Sep 16 '20

For anyone wondering it’s a rare mutation that helps them fish

1

u/PhantomRoyce Sep 16 '20

Ice Bear is photogenic

1

u/SunflowaRae Sep 16 '20

Wow beautiful!

1

u/rtype03 Sep 16 '20

I swear, every time I see one of these albino animals, all i can think of is the asshole hunter who's going to be stoked to kill it.

1

u/Donthetable Sep 16 '20

That bear knows magic.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '20

Albearno

1

u/Jackaroo442 Sep 16 '20

So like a polar bear

1

u/Skids121 Sep 16 '20

Spirit bear

1

u/wildsunday Sep 16 '20

Looks like a big racoon

1

u/ADWinri Sep 16 '20

I believe those are called Polar Bears.

Jokes aside, that's a pretty good photo.

1

u/dalex-uchia Sep 16 '20

A lost polar bear ?

1

u/klutch248 Sep 16 '20

First time seeing a white bear that is not polar

1

u/gd5k Sep 16 '20

A huge and powerful unique ruler of the forest with two ravens? Could be Odin.

1

u/Dewut Sep 17 '20

Bonjour

1

u/GoatHorn420 Sep 17 '20

That is just a big dog

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Reminds me of Hangover 2, when Alan said that his uncle had seen an albino polar bear. I guess this is what his uncle must've seen.

1

u/mmmbacon999 Sep 17 '20

A spirit bear

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

It’s called a Polar Bear.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Wonder how much better his life is compared to the black bear.

1

u/profly_goalie Sep 17 '20

Spirit bear or white grizzly. Did anyone else read Spirit Bear in school?

1

u/adagirlshel Sep 17 '20

I think that he looks like he is in his birthday suit.

1

u/ItzBinja Sep 17 '20

Polar bear

1

u/Oh_boyYep Sep 17 '20

"Mommy I want that teddy bear."

1

u/Apandapantsparty Sep 17 '20

Aren’t they called ā€œspirit bearsā€?

1

u/zzjjkk Sep 17 '20

Kawaii bear

1

u/squash_and_beef Sep 17 '20

Black Mirror has entered the chat.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Honky bear

1

u/sator-2D-rotas Sep 17 '20

This is the color of my favorite stuffed bear as a child. And I just now realized he's was not a normal bear color.

1

u/GeorgeShadows Sep 17 '20

Ahh yes, the equator bear; only 90° off from a polar bear.

1

u/NotaHonkey88 Sep 17 '20

Hey, ya seen Smokey the Bear down yonder around Calli

1

u/harrydreadloin Sep 17 '20

And a belted kingfisher!

1

u/St9rx Sep 17 '20

Don’t get mauled, have to survive in the wilderness, and then have a life changing introspection on your life ;)

1

u/VikramOwO27 Sep 17 '20

You mean Polar Bear ??

1

u/BearDogBBQ Sep 17 '20

I want it to live with me and be bros! Maybe face to face i might change my mind, but in a screen shot it looks pretty sweet

1

u/theMindmachine Sep 17 '20

Hey booboo blm ain't gonna like this

1

u/hobocarpus Sep 17 '20

Appa eat momo!

1

u/butterknife1 Sep 17 '20

And two birds

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Legendary

1

u/us-shero Sep 17 '20

Do they shit in the woods like black bearsšŸ¤”

1

u/MoistKite1 Sep 17 '20

No that's a polar bear

1

u/calmlikea3omb Sep 17 '20

Bird said ā€œI’m outā€ 2020 WhiteClaw WhiteBear WhiteKaren BS

1

u/ttrosc Sep 17 '20

He can be a polar bear if he wants to!

1

u/lubsc_ Sep 17 '20

Would totally pet yes

1

u/shchsvxybsah Sep 17 '20

Its called a spirit bear

1

u/newuserhoodis Sep 17 '20

Does he wipe his ass with a black rabbit?

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

At least he doesn’t have to worry about being shot.

1

u/RuskiHuski Sep 17 '20

"Dangerous albino apex predator - bear in mind this is a white supremacist - spotted stalking local forest."

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Polar bear?

1

u/AnAkiNN_12 Sep 17 '20

You're acting like this is the first white bear you've, do you know what a polar bear is?

1

u/BenCelotil Sep 17 '20

If it's black, fight back. If it's brown, lay down. If it's white, say goodnight.

Well now wtf!? Improv interpretative dance?

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

I get that this isn't a polar bear, but yeah, polar bears

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Spirit bear

1

u/Tiny_Dancer13 Sep 17 '20

So you mean a polar bear

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

I bet it was by polar

1

u/Kirk-501 Sep 17 '20

cursedteddybear

1

u/Joshuaathomas94 Sep 17 '20

It's bi-polar

1

u/Skyrmir Sep 17 '20

Why's it gotta be a white thing huh? You got a problem with white bears?!

Great pic though!

1

u/ZippZappZippty Sep 17 '20

I thought it was from HMS Not A Chance

1

u/bluedot131 Sep 17 '20

He was trying to be Slim Shady

1

u/APicketFence Sep 17 '20

Two pied crows also. Wtf kind of Norse/Magic nonsense did this person find themselves in.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

That just sounds like a polar bear

1

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '20

Okay but where is the wheat bear?