Post by OldGreenVulture on Jun 3, 2019 8:45:17 GMT
Polar bear predation on walrus accounts:
From walruses we pass to bears. Mr.Lamont believes that the Polar Bear - the Ursus Maritimus of naturalists - is, in a state of nature, the largest and strongest carnivorous animal in the world. Be this as it may, his first specimen - the one which he was watching through the old opera-glass of which we have spoken - was a monster. His carcass measured eight feet in length, and almost as much in circumference. He stood four and a half feet high at the shoulder. The fore-paws were 34 inches around. His weight was at least 1200 pounds: of this the fat constituted 400 pounds, and the hide 100. When skinned, his neck and shoulders were like those of a bull. The hunters say that he will kill the biggest bull-walrus, although nearly three times his own weight, by springing upon him from behind, and battering in his skull by repeated blows. Mr. Lamont believes this, though he doubts the stories told of the way in which he is killed by hunters. One man, who professes to know all about it, says that the hunters use a spear having a cross-piece a couple of feet from the point. Hunter presents point to Ursus; Ursus seizes spear by cross-piece, and in trying to drag it away buries the blade in his own body, and so kills himself.
And this:
Stout as he is, Ursa maritimus has to use cunning to get a living. He relies mainly upon walruses and seals. Though quite competent to manage the biggest walrus singly, he is overmatched by a herd; and unluckily for him walruses are apt to go in herds. He can not pick up a "junger" without bringing down upon him a score of tusked cousins and uncles. Then the seals are so shrewd. In the water they do not fear him. They can outswim and outdive him. There they will play around him in a manner calculated to aggravate his feelings to the utmost. Mr. Lamont thinks he catches one in the water now and then, but he can not con- ceive how he does it. Upon the ice Ursa has the advantage. But the seals know this, and sleep with both ears and one eye open. But Ursa's eyes and nose are of the sharpest. When either of these tell him that seals are floating about on the ice he slips into the water, half a mile or so to the leeward, and paddles quietly along, with his nose only visible, until he is close under the cake of ice on the very edge of which the seal is reposing. Then one jump, and a blow of his huge paw, settles the business. Between strength and cunning Ursa manages to make a quite comfortable living, and keep himself in very good order. Three which Mr. Lamont killed yielded 600 pounds of fat. "What a thousand pities," he exclaims, "that it is not worth 3s. 6d. a pot, as in the Burlington Arcade!"
www.explorenorth.com/library/weekly/aa032201c.htm
INTERACTIONS BETWEEN POLAR BEARS AND OVERWINTERING WALRUSES IN THE CENTRAL CANADIAN HIGH ARCTIC
WENDY CALVERT, Canadian Wildlife Service, 5320 122 Street, Edmonton, AB T6H 3S5
IAN STIRLING, Canadian Wildlife Service, 5320 122 Street, Edmonton, AB T6H 3S5 and Department of Zoology, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB T6G 2E9
Abstract:
There are few records of predation by polar bears (Ursus maritimus) on walruses (Odobenus rosmarus), although their distributions overlap extensively. During the late winter and early spring from 1981 through 1989, we recorded interactions between polar bears and walruses in the central Canadian High Arctic, where walrus movements are severely restricted in the winter by limited areas of open water for breathing and haulout holes. Predatory behavior of bears and anti-predator behavior of walruses were observed. We found evidence that polar bears made wounding but non-fatal attacks on 3 walruses, killed 3 walruses, and probably killed 4 others. One\ walrus was frozen out of its breathing hole and vulnerable to predation. Although the vulnerability of walruses to polar bear predation would vary with habitats and seasons, it is clear that polar bears are important predators of walruses in the central Canadian High Arctic in late winter-early spring.
[/url]www.bearbiology.com/fileadmin/tpl/Downloads/URSUS/Vol_8/Calvert_Stirling_8.pdf
More accounts:
"Polar bears, Ursus rnaritirnus, are large, powerful predators
that sometimes attack and kill species such as the walrus,
Odobenus rosrnarus (KiliaanandS tirling, 1978a)n d the bearded
seal, Erignathus barbatus (Stirling and Archibald, 1977; Smith,
1980), which can be heavier and larger than themselves."
Walruses that overwinter in an area with restricted access to water become potentially vulnerable to predation by polar bears. Three observations support this. On 19 April 1976 one of us (HPLK) found two walruses that apparently had been killed by polar bears. One was an adult female 22+ years old (289 cm long, estimated weight 400+ kg). There was blood on top of her frozen over haul-out hole, indicating that she might have been frozen out when the bear attacked. The other walrus (unsexed) was just under 2 years old (243 cm long, estimated weight 270 kg). A blood trail indicated that it had been captured beside or in a 60 cm wide channel that went around the circumference of a 25 to 30 m diameter grounded iceberg.
Examination showed that both walruses had large numbers of sharp deep punctures about their heads which could only have been made by bear claws, suggesting that they may have been killed by multiple blows. Soper (1928) quotes a report by Hantzch of a large bear in the vicinity of Kikerten Islands, Cumberland Gulf, attacking three walruses and killing a large male which it tore extensively about the head. Akpaleeapik, a Grise Fiord Eskimo, also informed us of a walrus that a polar bear killed with a blow in the head as it surfaced to breathe through a hole in the ice. On 29 April 1976 Mr. Tai-Ho of Klondike Helicopters tracked a polar bear to a walrus that he estimated to be less than 3 m long with tusks 20 to 25 cm long. Tracks and blood in the snow around the walrus's breathing hole (1 to 1.5 m diameter) indicated a fight had taken place very recently. The walrus was covered with blood and one tusk was broken. Despite a careful search, no bear tracks leading away from the site were found, suggesting that the bear may have been killed and sunk in the water. Freuchen (1935) reported finding a polar bear that had been killed by a walrus, and Perry (1966) summarizes similar observations from the journals of early arctic explorers. Although predation by bears is likely not of any significance to the walrus population as a whole (Mansfield, 1958; Loughrey, 1959) such encounters may be more frequent than previously seemed apparent.
H. P. L. Kiliaan and Ian Stirling, Observations on Overwintering Walruses in the Eastern Canadian High Arctic. Journal of Mammalogy Vol. 59, No. 1 (Feb., 1978), pp. 197-200.
The polar bear and walrus, traditional rivals, occasionally come in contact while feeding on whale carcasses or while killing seals. If a walrus is in the water, a polar bear will not enter. The walrus is the only polar animal that the bear really fears.
Reaching fifteen feet in length and weighing as much as one and a half tons, the walrus is more than a formidable adversary. If the two animals encounter each other on land, the polar bear will have an edge. When they meet each other in the water, the walrus has been known to grab the polar bear from below and, using his ivory tusks, which often grow more than thirty inches in length, to stab the bear in the back, driving the tusks to the hilt. The carcasses of polar bears and walruses have been found coupled in this manner.
Koch, T.J. 1975 The Year of the Polar Bear p. 81.
From walruses we pass to bears. Mr.Lamont believes that the Polar Bear - the Ursus Maritimus of naturalists - is, in a state of nature, the largest and strongest carnivorous animal in the world. Be this as it may, his first specimen - the one which he was watching through the old opera-glass of which we have spoken - was a monster. His carcass measured eight feet in length, and almost as much in circumference. He stood four and a half feet high at the shoulder. The fore-paws were 34 inches around. His weight was at least 1200 pounds: of this the fat constituted 400 pounds, and the hide 100. When skinned, his neck and shoulders were like those of a bull. The hunters say that he will kill the biggest bull-walrus, although nearly three times his own weight, by springing upon him from behind, and battering in his skull by repeated blows. Mr. Lamont believes this, though he doubts the stories told of the way in which he is killed by hunters. One man, who professes to know all about it, says that the hunters use a spear having a cross-piece a couple of feet from the point. Hunter presents point to Ursus; Ursus seizes spear by cross-piece, and in trying to drag it away buries the blade in his own body, and so kills himself.
And this:
Stout as he is, Ursa maritimus has to use cunning to get a living. He relies mainly upon walruses and seals. Though quite competent to manage the biggest walrus singly, he is overmatched by a herd; and unluckily for him walruses are apt to go in herds. He can not pick up a "junger" without bringing down upon him a score of tusked cousins and uncles. Then the seals are so shrewd. In the water they do not fear him. They can outswim and outdive him. There they will play around him in a manner calculated to aggravate his feelings to the utmost. Mr. Lamont thinks he catches one in the water now and then, but he can not con- ceive how he does it. Upon the ice Ursa has the advantage. But the seals know this, and sleep with both ears and one eye open. But Ursa's eyes and nose are of the sharpest. When either of these tell him that seals are floating about on the ice he slips into the water, half a mile or so to the leeward, and paddles quietly along, with his nose only visible, until he is close under the cake of ice on the very edge of which the seal is reposing. Then one jump, and a blow of his huge paw, settles the business. Between strength and cunning Ursa manages to make a quite comfortable living, and keep himself in very good order. Three which Mr. Lamont killed yielded 600 pounds of fat. "What a thousand pities," he exclaims, "that it is not worth 3s. 6d. a pot, as in the Burlington Arcade!"
www.explorenorth.com/library/weekly/aa032201c.htm
INTERACTIONS BETWEEN POLAR BEARS AND OVERWINTERING WALRUSES IN THE CENTRAL CANADIAN HIGH ARCTIC
WENDY CALVERT, Canadian Wildlife Service, 5320 122 Street, Edmonton, AB T6H 3S5
IAN STIRLING, Canadian Wildlife Service, 5320 122 Street, Edmonton, AB T6H 3S5 and Department of Zoology, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB T6G 2E9
Abstract:
There are few records of predation by polar bears (Ursus maritimus) on walruses (Odobenus rosmarus), although their distributions overlap extensively. During the late winter and early spring from 1981 through 1989, we recorded interactions between polar bears and walruses in the central Canadian High Arctic, where walrus movements are severely restricted in the winter by limited areas of open water for breathing and haulout holes. Predatory behavior of bears and anti-predator behavior of walruses were observed. We found evidence that polar bears made wounding but non-fatal attacks on 3 walruses, killed 3 walruses, and probably killed 4 others. One\ walrus was frozen out of its breathing hole and vulnerable to predation. Although the vulnerability of walruses to polar bear predation would vary with habitats and seasons, it is clear that polar bears are important predators of walruses in the central Canadian High Arctic in late winter-early spring.
[/url]www.bearbiology.com/fileadmin/tpl/Downloads/URSUS/Vol_8/Calvert_Stirling_8.pdf
More accounts:
"Polar bears, Ursus rnaritirnus, are large, powerful predators
that sometimes attack and kill species such as the walrus,
Odobenus rosrnarus (KiliaanandS tirling, 1978a)n d the bearded
seal, Erignathus barbatus (Stirling and Archibald, 1977; Smith,
1980), which can be heavier and larger than themselves."
Walruses that overwinter in an area with restricted access to water become potentially vulnerable to predation by polar bears. Three observations support this. On 19 April 1976 one of us (HPLK) found two walruses that apparently had been killed by polar bears. One was an adult female 22+ years old (289 cm long, estimated weight 400+ kg). There was blood on top of her frozen over haul-out hole, indicating that she might have been frozen out when the bear attacked. The other walrus (unsexed) was just under 2 years old (243 cm long, estimated weight 270 kg). A blood trail indicated that it had been captured beside or in a 60 cm wide channel that went around the circumference of a 25 to 30 m diameter grounded iceberg.
Examination showed that both walruses had large numbers of sharp deep punctures about their heads which could only have been made by bear claws, suggesting that they may have been killed by multiple blows. Soper (1928) quotes a report by Hantzch of a large bear in the vicinity of Kikerten Islands, Cumberland Gulf, attacking three walruses and killing a large male which it tore extensively about the head. Akpaleeapik, a Grise Fiord Eskimo, also informed us of a walrus that a polar bear killed with a blow in the head as it surfaced to breathe through a hole in the ice. On 29 April 1976 Mr. Tai-Ho of Klondike Helicopters tracked a polar bear to a walrus that he estimated to be less than 3 m long with tusks 20 to 25 cm long. Tracks and blood in the snow around the walrus's breathing hole (1 to 1.5 m diameter) indicated a fight had taken place very recently. The walrus was covered with blood and one tusk was broken. Despite a careful search, no bear tracks leading away from the site were found, suggesting that the bear may have been killed and sunk in the water. Freuchen (1935) reported finding a polar bear that had been killed by a walrus, and Perry (1966) summarizes similar observations from the journals of early arctic explorers. Although predation by bears is likely not of any significance to the walrus population as a whole (Mansfield, 1958; Loughrey, 1959) such encounters may be more frequent than previously seemed apparent.
H. P. L. Kiliaan and Ian Stirling, Observations on Overwintering Walruses in the Eastern Canadian High Arctic. Journal of Mammalogy Vol. 59, No. 1 (Feb., 1978), pp. 197-200.
The polar bear and walrus, traditional rivals, occasionally come in contact while feeding on whale carcasses or while killing seals. If a walrus is in the water, a polar bear will not enter. The walrus is the only polar animal that the bear really fears.
Reaching fifteen feet in length and weighing as much as one and a half tons, the walrus is more than a formidable adversary. If the two animals encounter each other on land, the polar bear will have an edge. When they meet each other in the water, the walrus has been known to grab the polar bear from below and, using his ivory tusks, which often grow more than thirty inches in length, to stab the bear in the back, driving the tusks to the hilt. The carcasses of polar bears and walruses have been found coupled in this manner.
Koch, T.J. 1975 The Year of the Polar Bear p. 81.
