#polarbear

#polarbear

Polar Bear Hunting a Reindeer Caught on Film for the First TimeIn August 2020, a biologist named Izabela Kulaszewicz, together with the other scientists from the University of Gdańsk, hurried outside as she received a message that a polar bear was spotted. The scientists were stationed at the Polish Polar Station Hornsund on Norway’s Svalbard archipelago in the Arctic Ocean.This is an unexpected sighting. Luckily, the cook at the research station was able to film everything: a chunky female polar bear was sniffing the air and walking towards the coast, dipping in the tundra, and then galloping towards several reindeers on the shoreline. The bull went to the sea but the polar bear was able to catch and kill it. The reindeer was dead in less than a minute.Kulaszewicz and the rest of the team were shocked because polar bears usually hunt seals. Polar bear’s behavior of hunting of reindeer, however, has long been assumed especially because of climate change. To be able to survive, polar bears would have to adjust to the changing environment which forced them to hunt and eat those that they do not usually eat such as bird eggs, rodents, trash, and landfills.#polarbear #reindeer #arctic #tundra

Polar Bears Take Down Walruses by Hurling Rocks and IceWhile polar bears mostly eat seals, a good-sized walrus would supply a hefty amount of meat. But walruses are huge, up to 2500 pounds, with thick skulls and dangerous tusks. To land a walrus, a bear must get creative. An account published in 1865 relays an Inuit tale of polar bears hunting walruses by taking the high ground and then throwing rocks down at the pinnipeds. Scientists scoffed at these stories, because bears don't use tools. Or do they? Ian Stirling of the University of Alberta, Edmonton, led a team of researchers looking into the possibility. Stirling and his colleagues determined that polar bears clobbering walruses made sense. Their study cites the example of a five-year-old male polar bear named GoGo using objects as tools to get food in a Japanese zoo. The bear used sticks—as well as throwing a large tire—to knock down meals placed on inaccessible perches. According to the study, “GoGo demonstrated an exceptional and previously undocumented degree of conceptual creativity to facilitate access to a food item hanging from the air.”“The most significant part of this is that a bear is able to look at a situation, think of it in a three-dimensional sense, and then figure out what it might have to do to be successful,” Stirling tells Ginella Massa of “As It Happens” on CBC Radio.Smarter than the average bear? Read more on tool-using polar bears at Smithsonian. #PolarBear #animalbehavior #animaltooluse #walrus