Polar Bear

Polar bears live in the Arctic. They do not stay in one place. They travel across the snow and pack ice looking for food. Sometimes they swim far out to sea.

When the bears come ashore in the summer they eat plants and berries.

In late summer and early autumm the bears go along the coastline looking for dead whales and dead walruses. They also eat lemmings, arctic foxes and birds.

Their favorite food is the ringed seal. The polar bear waits by the seal's breathing holes in the ice and quickly snatches the seal when it pokes its head out of the hole.              

The female ususally has two cubs. Sometimes she may have three. When the cubs are born they are very tiny. They weigh less than less than a kilogram (less than two pounds). The cubs are hairless, blind and deaf. The mother can hide them in between the toes of her front paws.

In November or December the cubs are born in dens in the snow. They stay in the den for about three months. The cubs are safe and protected from the cold and the wind. The mother feeds them milk but she has nothing to eat.

The mother and her cubs leave the den in March or April. The cubs stay with their mother for about two years. In one year the cubs are as big as a person.

A female polar bear gives birth every third year.

Polar bears are able to swim in the icy Arctic Ocean without freezing. They have thick oily fur coats and a layer of fat under their skin. When bears comes out of the water they shake the water off their coats.

The bear's large feet are like snowshoes. The hair on the soles of its feet help the bear walk on the slippery ice and snow. The bear walks with toes pointing inward to avoid slipping.

Polar bears are good swimmers. They paddle with their front legs and use their hind legs as rudders.

The polar bear has a very good sense of smell and can sniff dead animals from far away and can find seals in dens beneath the snow.

The polar bear's huge teeth are for tearing the prey apart.