Predators, parasites and pathogens Bear
hunters shot bear, sweden, 20th century
as animals @ summit of food chain, bears not have many predators. important humans, , started cultivating crops, increasingly came in conflict bears raided them. since invention of firearms, people have been able kill bears greater ease. tiger four-legged predator regularly preys on adult bears, including brown bears, sloth bears, asiatic black bears, , sun bears.
bears parasitized eighty species of parasites, including single-celled protozoans , gastro-intestinal worms, , nematodes , flukes in heart, liver, lungs , bloodstream. externally have ticks, fleas , lice. study of american black bears found seventeen species of endoparasite including protozoan sarcocystis, parasitic worm diphyllobothrium mansonoides, , nematodes dirofilaria immitis, capillaria aerophila, physaloptera sp., strongyloides sp. , others. of these, d. mansonoides , adult c. aerophila causing pathological symptoms. contrast, polar bears have few parasites; many parasitic species need secondary, terrestrial, host, , polar bear s life style such few alternative hosts exist in environment. protozoan toxoplasma gondii has been found in polar bears, , nematode trichinella nativa can cause serious infection , decline in older polar bears. bears in north america infected morbillivirus similar canine distemper virus. susceptible infectious canine hepatitis (cav-1), free-living black bears dying rapidly of encephalitis , hepatitis.
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