The Himalayan Black Bear 



includes the greater part of the middle and outer ranges. 

 The species is found all over the Kashmir valley, as it 

 is in Kishtwar and Chamba, but whether it occurs in 

 the upper part of the Maru-Wardwan and Tilel valleys 

 is difficult to ascertain. I have never seen it in Tilel, 

 and it never extends into the treeless districts north 

 of Kashmir ; but the mum, or mumh, of Baluchistan, 

 which Dr. Blanford identified with the present species, 

 apparently inhabits open and more or less desert dis- 

 tricts, where its mode of life must differ considerably 

 from that of the Kashmir black bear. From 9000 to 

 10,000, or even 12,000 feet, is given as the elevation 

 to which these bears ascend in the summer in the 

 Himalaya, while they are stated to descend in winter 

 to 5000 feet or even less. They are common in 

 summer in many parts of the Kashmir valley, the 

 greater portion of which is not much over 5000 feet 

 above sea-level. 



Kashmiri shikaris are more afraid of the black bear 

 than they are of its brown relative ; and although this 

 may be partially due to the fiercer disposition of the 

 former, it also seems attributable to the different kinds 

 of country in which the two animals are stalked. A 

 brown bear when hard hit while grazing on a grassy 

 hill -side can scarcely fail to roll headlong down the 

 slope. On the other hand, a black bear when wounded 

 on the comparatively flat ground of a forest has no such 

 involuntary means of avoiding an encounter with its 

 aggressor. Apart from this, there is no doubt that a 

 far larger number of Kashmiris are mauled by black 

 than by brown bears ; although this is due to the fact 

 that it is the former species which chiefly ascends fruit- 

 trees in the Kashmir valley. Thirty years ago it was 

 quite common to see three, four, or even more, black 

 bears up a single mulberry or walnut tree ; and the 

 Kashmiri coolie thought nothing of ascending the same 

 tree, armed with nothing better than a stout lathi 

 (cudgel), in order to drive off the robbers. Conse- 



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