Ursavus

Ursavus is an extinct genus of ursid carnivoran mammals that existed in North America, Europe, and Asia during the Miocene, living from about 23—5.3 million years ago (Mya), existing for roughly 17.7 million years. It evolved from the bear-dog The genus apparently dispersed from Asia into North America about 20 Mya, becoming the earliest member of the subfamily Ursinae in the New World. Qiu points out that if a questionable 29-million-year-old specimen of Ursavus reported in North America is validated, Ursavus may have evolved in North America and dispersed westward into Asia. The higher number of fossils in Europe grading toward eastern Asia make the westward dispersal unlikely.

Ursavus was named by Schlosser (1899). It was assigned to the family Ursidae by Schlosser (1899) and R. L. Carroll (1988); and to Ursavini by R.M. Hunt (1998) and Jin et al. (2007).

In life, the various species would have been between cat-sized for the smaller species and wolf-sized for the larger members of the genus and were mainly ground-dwelling omnivores or hypocarnivores.