Species: Ursus arctos

H - >2,500,000 square km (greater than 1,000,000 square miles) - H - Formerly throughout western North America, north from northern Mexico; northwestern Africa, all of the Palearctic from western Europe, Near and Middle East through the northern Himalayas to western and northern China and Chukot (Russia) and Hokkaido (Japan) (Wozencraft, in Wilson and Reeder 1993); see Pasitschniak-Arts (1993) for additional details. In North America, present range includes Alaska, northern and western Canada, northern Continental Divide in Montana, Cabinet/Yaak mountains in Montana/Idaho, Selkirk Mountains in Idaho/Washington, Northern Cascades in Washington, and Yellowstone area, Wyoming/Montana/Idaho. Some bears in the Cabinet-Yaak ecosystem of Montana and Idaho and Selkirk ecosystem of Idaho and Washington mingle in the Purcell Mountains in southern British Columbia, and movement data indicate that the Cabinet-Yaak and Selkirk populations are connected to a much larger population (several hundred bears) extending north into British Columbia (USFWS 1999). However, the listed distinct population segment is confined to the U.S. portion of these ecosystems. Common only in Alaska, parts of the Yukon, northern and coastal British Columbia, and portions of the northern Rocky Mountains. USFWS has proposed reintroduction in the Bitterroot ecosystem of east-central Idaho and adjacent Montana. In Europe, apart from northern Europe, distribution has shrunk to a few isolated populations in the Pyrenees, the Apenines, the Alps, the Balkan Peninsula, and the Carpathians (see Hartl and Hell 1994).