Grizzly Bears are one of the fiercest and most dominant predators in all of North America, being veritable “Kings of the forest” from the northern United States, throughout all of western Canada, and into Alaska. However, like all species, grizzly bears start out as cute little versions of themselves, known as ‘cubs’, who are concerned more with playing and sleeping than hunting or preying. Even as adults, despite their ability to prey on anything that enters their habitat, grizzlies tend to eat mostly fish, nuts, berries, fruit, leaves, and roots. With a height between 5 and 8 ft (1.5 to 2.5 m), and a weight of up to 800 lbs (363kg), the grizzly bear is one of the largest land mammals in the world, especially in North America, but they are none-the-less the inspiration for teddy bears. On a hunting expedition, celebrated President Theodore Roosevelt refused to put down an elderly grizzly, resulting in a political cartoonist consistently drawing Roosevelt with bear cubs surrounding him. A toy maker began producing small stuffed versions of these bears and called them “Teddy Bears”.
