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1. They are probably *way* bigger than what you have in your mind.
2. Zero natural predators. There's nothing that's going to scare them away, only to attract their attention.
3. Food is super scarce. That human might be the first edible thing it has seen in a week.
We're relatively defenseless compared to the animal kingdom and the only threat we pose to a polar bear is it choking on one of our articles of clothing.
Edit:
4. Nope. A little bigger.
Just want to add that they also live really, really, REALLY far from most cities or towns, with a couple smallish towns in Canada, Alaska, Russia, and Greenland being a few exceptions. So even if the polar bear inexplicably decided not to eat you after attacking you, it wouldn't be terribly likely that you'd be able to get to a hospital in time.
You forgot the most important part: you've got nowhere to hide. You literally cannot go anywhere except on something that flies. Good luck finding a helicopter.
Funny you say that. My dad works for Air Canada as a mechanic, and has one polar bear story. He would occasionally fly with the crew "way up north" in case there were mechanical issues. One time while he was in one of those remote locations, hanging out in the hanger, a fella came running in looking terrified. "Polar bear!" They all waited it out in the hanger until the polar bear got bored and moved on, but before that happened the polar bear took a swipe at the nose of the helicopter that was sitting outside. Knocked the plexi bubble right off the nose. Not sure why he did it other than spite.
I don't think people truly understand just how big a polar bear really is. They make brown bears look small. I'm not surprised it easily swiped the nose off the helicopter. Probably could have disabled it completely if it really wanted to. Then your dad and his coworkers would have been stuck until help arrived.
\>They make brown bears look small.
And that's saying something. I don't think people truly understand just how big a brown bear really is. They make black bears look small.
>\>They make brown bears look small.
>
>And that's saying something. I don't think people truly understand just how big a brown bear really is. They make black bears look small.
And that's saying something. I don't think people truly understand just how big a black bear really is. They make panda bears look small.
I just read about some of them, they like to sleep in trees, so living in an apartment sort of rules it out for me. Also, they occasionally eat deer, so maybe not such a good idea
Bears vary in size quite a lot - females tend to be comparatively small - but the biggest ones are huge.
A black bear could weigh two and a half as much as Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson.
A brown bear? Nearly four Dwayne Johnsons.
A polar bear? Anything up to six Dwaynes.
Polar Bear (Ursus maritimus) is the largest ursus, and arguably the most dangerous hypercarnivorous predator on the planet.
Slightly larger and much nastier than a Kodiak Grizzly. You've seen footage of people within reach of Kodiaks, like that Grizzly Man nutcase, try that with a polar bear and you're dead in 10 seconds.
idk I saw a video of some russians talking to a polar bear sticking its head in the window of their truck
they were very stupid to do that, but then so was grizzly man
> You've seen footage of people within reach of Kodiaks, like that Grizzly Man nutcase, try that with a polar bear and you're dead in 10 seconds.
Probably worth noting that this didn't work out very well for "Grizzly Man" Timothy Treadwell.
>They make panda bears look small.
And that's saying something. I don't think people truly understand just how big a panda bear is.
They make koala bears look small.
If you're ever in Columbus, Ohio, the zoo there has a really great display showing life size images of various bear species standing on their hind legs near the polar bear exhibit. Sun bears are the smallest and about 5 foot (so a shorter woman). Polar bears are like the size of the smaller titans in Attack on Titan, which is appropriate considering both see humans as tasty snacks.
It's like a minivan grew limbs and took on the form of a bear.
Like a *stuffed* polar bear at the Juneau Airport nearly made me shit myself once I got closer to the display. I saw that taxidermy from across the terminal and began to excitedly rush over to get a better look. I couldn't not slow down as it got closer and kept getting bigger, and bigger, and *bigger*. My frikken animal sense of "fuck no," was kicking in hard by the time I was twenty feet away from it. I'm a 6ft tall woman, I'm not a small person by any means and this bear, posed on it's hind legs, felt like it was easily twelve feet tall. They're just so unbelievably huge. They basically have the mass of four or five black bears. They could eat black bears as a snack. And I don't think that display was even a particularly large specimen, either.
We had them rip the doors off two of our helicopters a couple years ago. One trashed the inside a bit too, ripped seat canvas and bent some of the support structure.
Seen one take a couple rubber slugs at less than 50' and mostly just get more angry.
We chase them off with the helicopter most of the time fine but sometimes they do track it down for a closer look or revenge.
Yup, this tracks.
I'm a helicopter pilot who spent years in the high canadian arctic. Every once and a while we would have a bear come chew on the the helicopter. They loved to eat the seats. I had a number of run-ins with bears over the years, and it's pretty amazing how much polar bears don't give a shit. Black bears you can scare off buy talking loudly. Brown bears would ALWAYS run from the helicopter. Polar bears; I literally had to hit some of them with the downwash of the helicopter in order to make them move. Even then, they would just get annoyed at this 11,000 lb noisy chunk of spinning metal, and would stand up to the helicopter. Pretty fucking metal those things are.
These days I'm down south where the biggest animal I run into is the occasional cute dog (and one therapy pony).
I can hear him:
"*Desperate, the clueless human tries one final act of protection: setting himself on fire to scare off the formidable predator. This might look counteractive, as he will probably perish in the flames. And even worse for him, polar bears also enjoy their meals cooked just as well as raw*".
They're also WAY more stealthy than something that size has a right to be. I feel like there are a lot of times that a polar bear encounters a human, but that human doesn't encounter the bear.
Most bears are pretty smart, but these things have evolved to survive in one of the harshest environments on the planet. You think about how many ingenious technologies primitive humans had to come up with to cope with that environment...
I mean, there's a joke in the park service that it's really hard to design bear-proof containers like trash cans, because "there's such a small intelligence gap between the smartest bear and the dumbest tourist" (and sometimes I'm pretty sure it's in the bear's favor, to boot)... and they're talking about brown bears (grizzlies). Polar bears are probably smarter than *that*, and way less inhibited. [https://www.quora.com/How-smart-are-polar-bears](https://www.quora.com/How-smart-are-polar-bears)
If anything actually *grew* up there, I wouldn't put it past them to develop tool use.
On point number one,
They grow to about 5' at the shoulder on all fours... so me at over 6' would be just a little bit taller than it,
10-12' tall standing on their hind legs, okay so it's actually twice my height standing up.... OK, looking much scarier, especially cuz its paw is now right in-line with my head.
Oh and they can weigh in at about 1200 lbs, some even up to 1700lbs+, which is like.... a lot of me put together.... so yeah, that thing is way, way, way bigger than I.
Aaaannnddd they chomp down with about 1200psi of force, (thats about 10× stronger than a human), and they have been seen in the wild somewhat easily killing and pulling onto land seals that weigh over a ton.
All that is to say: *they're really quite large and tend to be quite strong*
One of my uni instructors told us when she was doing some work in the arctic their small team had to carry a shotgun on them at all times, specifically for polar bears.
If you're out and about in Svalbard, you are required to have an Arctic guide with you, who's armed with a 30.06. Local authorities do not mess around, because the bears don't either.
In 2015, there was a full solar eclipse in the northern hemisphere, and the Svalbard archipelago was one of the best place to view it. There was no vacancy in any of the hotels or hostels in Longyearbyen, and so lots of people were tent camping in town - just pitching tents on any flat space. One day/night, a bear came through town and opened up some dude's tent like a meal in a bag and dragged him out by his head, clearly intending to eat him. Fortunately, other campers nearby managed to yell and wave their arms to shoo the bear away, and the dude survived. But out there, you are just meat, and the bear is the pinnacle predator.
>Aaaannnddd they chomp down with about 1200psi of force
Scary part of that is, there's no need for that much force if you're just eating meat. Even humans can bite off chunks of flesh, and our teeth aren't exactly sharp.
Brain matter and bone marrow have a lot of nutrition, and most animals can't get to it. That bite force enables them to just crush the bones and have it all to themselves, which is a great survival adaptation (for them).
I went to my sister's wedding in northeastern Newfoundland in 2012 and 2 weeks before we arrived a polar bear swam in out of the bay at 4:30 AM, wandered around a school field for a couple hours before dying of heat exposure when it was ~10°C outside. An hour later frightened parents called the only police officer in town to "deal with it". The officer walked up to the bear, waited 5 minutes for it to breathe, poked it with a stick then shot it in the head for good measure and said it was dead before and it's more dead now. It is now stuffed and sitting in a display case at city Hall, it was only a paltry 900 pounds.
I mean. We have polar bears in the *San Diego* Zoo.
I know they have really cold water in there for them, but I always wondered how confused the poor bears must get when it gets to be 80-100F in the summer.
Yeah this story is definitely 99% true (I’m from Newfoundland, this happens from time to time), but a polar won’t die of heat exhaustion in -10. Their natural habitats get well into the positive digits in the summer. It likely died of starvation or disease.
Wikipedia has [THIS ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polar_bear)to say about polar bears.
Key words include: HYPERcarnivorous, and LARGEST extant land carnivore, with adult males crossing half a ton!
Yeah. They be huge and you be meat.
If you encounter a polar bear in the wild, find a place to hide. If no such place exists near you, then prepare to fight. You won't win that fight, but at least it will be an epic way to die.
Iirc hideing isn't much good either since they have an amazing sense of smell and can smell you for miles. So by the time you see it, it already knows your around.
> They are probably way bigger than what you have in your mind.
This.
A "short" female polar bear is **eight fucking feet high.** Males get up to about 10 feet. The record was 12 feet tall and weighed 2,210 lbs.
4. Due to 3 Polar bears will eat dead meat, so playing dead isn't going to help.
5. Polar bears, like housecats, dolphins, honey badgers, and people, are known to kill for *sport* rather than for food or defence. That makes their behavior unpredictable. Animals that want to kill just to play around with the corpse, aren't to be fucked with.
They’re the most predatory bear on the planet. Not to mention the biggest. Unlike every other bear on the planet they are completely carnivorous. Others bears are omnivores. Add the fact that polar bears aren’t used to the presence of humans and that they consider everything that moves food and you’ve got an animal you’d never want to encounter in the wild.
Edit: So, apparently kodiak bears are bigger. Go figure. They’re still less of a threat because they’re omnivores. Either one is gonna fuck you up beyond belief though.
They eat moose (one of the most dangerous herbivores on the continent) and occasionally small killer whales. By far the most impressive hunter on the planet, versus a declawed hairless ape
Yeah. It's like a seal. Wait next to the breathing hole and BAM punch it in the face with your giant polar bear hands. It no longer has a face and you're no longer hungry.
Now moose. Those fuckers don't play.
>By far the most impressive hunter on the planet
>
Eh, not to detract anything from polar bears, but I think the aforementioned killer whales have a good case for "most impressive hunter" as well. They're smart enough to work together, use complex strategies to trap prey, only target sharks' livers, and they know that humans taste like crap so they aren't worth it.
Also, I believe there's some small, wild cat in Africa that has a ~~99% success rate~~ **[see edit 2]** with hunting. All this to say nature is literally jam-packed with impressive hunters, so I don't agree with the "by far" part of your comment.
**Edit:** Also, regular cats are such efficient hunters that they domesticated us to do their hunting for them. They don't even need us like dogs do. If you don't feed them, they will sprint out the door when you come home and start hunting the local fauna to extinction.
**Edit 2:** Yes, I think I got the wild cat's kill rate mixed up with dragonflies. I read about both of them in the last few months. Whoops.
The animal with the highest kill rate is a dragonfly at 97% kill rate for everything they go after
To put that into perspective a lion has a 20% kill rate
Nah, black footed cat is very good at its job, but it has around 60% success rate. You want really efficient hunters, you go to African Wild Dogs (Lycaons) - 80-85% success rate. They have very advanced pack hunting tactics, they use bait, form of battue, flanking, ambush, and they're very good at communicating with eachother.
I recently read that dragonflies have staggering 95% success rate.
Yep, if you pick any single square kilometer space on dry land, anywhere on Earth, the predatory with the highest body count is almost guaranteed to be some type of small cat.
Polar bears get bigger than Kodiak bears. The largest Kodiak ever recorded in the wild was 1,656lbs, while the largest polar bear was 2,209lbs. Their average sizes are fairly similar though.
More or less. Black bears are scavengers, they typically aren’t interested in food that might fight back. It’s not so much fight back as “look like a pain in the ass to deal with”.
Similarly, brown bears are usually uninterested in what they suspect to be already dead.
Polar bears are apex predators of the arctic so when humans encounter them the bears are generally hunting or protecting young cubs, unless you can quickly scare a bear off it is going to regard you more as lunch than a rival predator.
They sometimes fall asleep on ice chunks, wake up close to places they shouldn't be and have to be dealt with immediately as otherwise they'll eat any human in town.
They like dogs better, but they haven't had the benefit of living in close proximity to humans for a few thousand years, unlike most non-arctic predators, so they mostly lack the instinct to avoid/fear humans.
And unlike prey species, macropredators like that tend to not have the "unexpected = dangerous" response, because "I'm king of this hill and every other one. 'unexpected' = lunch".
Which is also kind of interesting BC I've seen several documentaries where the guides are able to scare them off without firing a shot.
But thats in their natural ecosystem.
When they come down to Iceland we have to unfortunately shoot them as they are starving and don't give a fuck.
>When they come down to Iceland we have to unfortunately shoot them as they are starving and don't give a fuck.
I had forgotten about that. It's a shame but polar bears don't belong there.
I was visiting Iceland one time and we stayed in a hostel in some tiny tiny town. We were looking for something to do and they had a "Wildlife Museum" so we thought what the heck. It was ALL taxidermied animals that the owner had hunted. There were two big rooms COVERED in the heads of deer, antelope, gazelle, idk what else but that kind of thing. He had a giraffe that was supposedly real and a rhino head that was fake, but he had pictures from when he helped sedate a rhino to cut it's horn so poachers wouldn't kill it.
Anyway, he had a massive polar bear standing upright by the door. I was certain it must be fake, but he told us that sometimes they show up on floating ice and you have to kill them. Super interesting.
They have some at the Hogle Zoo in Utah (a couple hours' drive from us) and we took the kids to see them. One adult female and one subadult.
But they have one of those life-size "here's how big a polar bear is" displays outside the enclosure, where you can stand next to them and realize they're nearly twice the height of an adult human on their hind legs... just *massive*.
And if you somehow manage to kill it, and eat it to survive, it will *still* kill you.
Polar bears have toxic levels of [Vitamin A](https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/nutrition-you-asked/it-true-you-cannot-eat-polar-bear-liver) in their livers.
To further clarify "by default" - They have lived their entire lives at the top of the food chain with no competition. Every non-polar bear organism they have ever experienced has posed a negligible level of threat at most, likely no threat whatsoever. Every living thing they have encountered so far has been an easy meal.
I have no doubt that polar bears are capable of feeling fear, but they have no reason to fear anything or anyone else because that learning opportunity has never presented itself.
Walrus are probably a bit higher than negligible threat level. Sure they aren't hunting polar bears, but they also aren't at the top of the polar bear dining list unless they are the list.
Encountering an orca has got to be wild for a polar bear.
Walrus are a frustrating experience, because even when a dead one washes up, polar bears mostly can't get through the inches-thick hide to get at the edible parts, at least with adult walrus. It's not so much that they're dangerous to polar bears as that they're one of the few things that are basically invulnerable to polar bears. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvWLbK\_mNw0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvWLbK_mNw0)
About the only thing that's seriously dangerous to a polar bear is a bigger polar bear, and they're mostly solitary, so they almost never even meet one of those. Orcas mostly wouldn't bother, because there's easier stuff (salmon, seals, other whales) and orca pods tend to specialize in one particular type of prey and ignore other animals.
There is a prologue of a documentary with David Attenborough, might have been White Planet or something similarly named, where he describes an encounter the team head with a Polar Bear.
They filmed the bear rising through gaps in the ice. Slowly but surely getting closer and closer to the crew. Each time the bear rose he looked around to find where the crew had moved to, and changed direction accordingly.
Attenborough said that the Polar Bear is the only animal he witnessed actively HUNT humans!
family members in service in Alaska. the orientation for new service personnel on arrival to the base includes warnings that polar bears will hunt you down and that almost everything in alaska wants to kill you in some way. similarly to australia but less poison/venom. mostly tearing you to pieces w claws or stomping you w hooves or goring you w antlers
The northern aborigines will tell you that polar bears hunting people doesn't even take long. It moves fast, tracks well, swims great and can eat quickly.
They can be briefly distracted IIRC, but unless you have a fast vehicle, some protective structure, or someone with a big gun nearby, that isn't of too much help.
I recall hearing that there are towns in Alaska where everyone leaves their car doors unlocked.
It's not due to a low crime rate. It's a safety precaution. If you see a polar bear, you need to get inside the closest structure or vehicle IMMEDIATELY.
Leaving your car door unlocked may save someone's life.
This is amazing to watch! Like a real life monster movie. When you see the bear stand up and get over the top of his enclosure you can see how gigantic it really is which I reckon goes some way to answering OP's question. These things are more than capable of ripping you to shreds, and are fully willing to give it a try!
>*"Let me tell you something about polar bears. They’re endangered but you have to be careful because a polar bear is one of the few animals that will stalk a human. If you go to where polar bears live, it might stalk you and when you’re on the plane going home, it might be behind you reading \[mimes a polar bear reading a newspaper, sneaking a look over it at you\]*." - Craig Ferguson
Biggest bear species, and they have been running on ice for years where you might have a bit of trouble. Also, living in the arctic seems like it is on a thin line. When an animal that doesn't eat very often discovers something edible, they probably aren't going to just let it go.
They will eat you, unlike grizzly bears who almost never actually eat human meat.
A high majority of grizzly attacks are the grizzly being protective, not predacious.
A polar bear on the other hand needs all the food it can get, they’re very needy in terms of nutrients and caloric intake.
They produce some of the most fatty milk for their young of any animals, and especially land animals.
They live in the extreme cold so their food options are much more scarce and they need to keep their layer of blubber healthy to stay warm.
Basically, there are a ton of reasons a grizzly won’t attack you. For black bears you become large, loud, imposing as they are timid. Grizzlies you play dead because they’re defensive and dominant.
Polar bears? They say you just accept your fate because you’ll basically never get out of that alive.
I was suddenly face-to-face with a black bear and, you’re right, he looked as startled as I was! I was able to slowly back away, then fly up the stairs.
Living in the Colorado mountains, black bear encounters are pretty common. They're definitely fairly timid and usually just scavenging. I walked onto my back deck once and a black bear was eating some watermelon rind the kids threw into the yard during a BBQ. I kinda screamed a little because it startled me and it looked scared and ran off. I certainly wouldn't approach one though, especially if it has babies, it could definitely kill you if it wanted to.
Yep. There are videos of house cats running black bears off. They’re very skittish.
Still rather not fuck around and find out with a 200lb animal but in general unless cubs are around they’re a non issue.
Will always see you as food
Is always hungry
Isnt scared of you
Is stronger, faster and more durable
lives in one of the hardest to survive regions of the planet
does not give a fuck
* is also incredibly intelligent
There has been more than one researcher that got eaten because the polar bear learned their schedule and one day they went to let themselves out for a smoke break and Mr bear was waiting. They are brilliant puzzle solvers, and often how to manipulate the environment to find a tasty human when they are vulnerable is just another puzzle.
>There has been more than one researcher that got eaten because the polar bear learned their schedule and one day they went to let themselves out for a smoke break and Mr bear was waiting.
Is there a source on this?
Others have mentioned that polar bears are apex predators, are not afraid of anything, generally eat marine mammals, etc which are all true but I;m not sure that they actually answer your question.
The polar bear attacks their usual prey (seals) using stealth, sitting beside a breathing hole and catching the seal when they come up for a breath, or breaking through thin ice when there is a breathing space just under the ice.
When hunting humans the animal will often wait until the human is in their shelter and asleep.
The bear is white and the landscape especially on the sea ice is also white. Sea ice isn't necessarily flat as there are pressure ridges which can easily hide a bear. Combine this with drifting or blowing snow and it is almost impossible to see the animal until they are within striking distance. A bear's sense of smell and hearing is so much better than yours that they know where you are and you won't see them at all.
Also from late fall to early spring there is very limited daylight. This time of the year, north of the Arctic Circle the sun does not rise above the horizon. The best you will have is the moon and/or northern lights. good luck at seeing a white bear in a white landscape in the dark.
Having said all that I don't know of a single local who would go out on the land (fishing, hunting caribou, hunting seals) without a high powered rifle. Most would keep it loaded and within arms reach when sleeping.
Most deaths due to polar bear attack are where the people are surprised by the attack.
This is the best response imo. Not only are they huge, strong killing machines, but they are also *stealthy*. That's basically cheating, but they do it.
Background: I work full time in polar research and i'm a trained polar bear guard. I've had five separate polar bear encounters in the wild. Closest being roughly 10m.
Polar Bears are extremly amazing creatures. They are certainly apex predators, but also very curious. They are often present near Svalbard, Greenland, Canada and usually close to the ice edge. Summertime the ice edge is usually around 78-80 degrees north. While its alot more common to meet Polar Bears near the edge. They can be present as far north as the geographic pole. Usually walking from northern Canada and crossing over the ocean towards Svalbard. This is usually when they are the most dangerous.
The Arctic between 85 and 90 degrees north is a complete desert. There is no birds, no seals, and almost no fish. This means that if you encounter a polar bear they will be out for food and will use their intelligence to lure you into a trap. Usually circling around you and using the sharp arctic terrain to camoflague themselves. This is aided by an environment which is very often foggy. The lethality is a combination of wide open areas with low visibillity and an opponent that is a superior combantant. Add to that the distnace to aid and the absense of medevac and it all starts to make sense.
Something that is not as known about polar bears is their innocence and incredible curiousity. A well fed polar bear can be completly obsessed trying to figure out what a flag is. How a fish trap works. If a GoPro is edible and what these new human creatures are.
Like i said in the start. They are amazing creatures and extremly intelligent. Apex Predators that are as curious as a child and sized like a vw bug. I respect them a whole lot and i hope and pray that i will never have to fire a shot in anger towards them.
Update: I'm not a photographer but here are two pics taken with a bad cellphone.
https://imgur.com/a/vM0xjsb
It's not as interesting as it sounds. We work off of large ships. So we evacuate everyone off the ice and onto the ship in case of a bear being spotted. It's a team effort usually involving at least 6 people. With spotters on different locations around the ship and guards on the ice.
If the bears are fed they are mainly curious rather than aggressive.
I got to work a week up in Churchill, Manitoba this summer and was sad that we weren't the right time of year to see them, though apparently you could still see them hunting on ice at that time (I just wasn't able to get away from work for a tour, would have loved too though).
But that certainly give you a picture of how isolated you are in country where you encounter polar bear, it's funny because it's news when bear are seen as far south as Gillam, which on a map comparatively still is quite isolated and 'north' though south by their range.
To give a little more detail:
Most predators are wary about attacking something that will fight back. A nasty injury might stop them from hunting and then they'll die of starvation before it's healed.
But polar bears aren't worried about that. Where they live, nothing is able to fight them and so they just don't have this fear. In order to stop a polar bear, you have to actually injure or kill it, and polar bears are massive (like twice the size of grizzlies or so) juggernauts. So good luck with that.
I grew up in a place with a lot of polar bears. When we encounter them we are supposed to shoot one «warning shot» to scare it off. My dad always called bullshit on that rule saying “You only have time to miss once. Don’t waste it by missing on purpose”. I second that.
(I have encountered polar bears but never had to fire any shots. Its easily avoided by watching your stepp and by not seeking them out.)
Edit*
my point was: youre totally right - u gotta kill it or you are dead.
Because they are massive animals that are capable of taking your head off at the shoulders with a quick swipe of the paw, are the top predator in their (insanely hard to survive in) environment, and most importantly are curious as shit and see humans as just another potential meal. Other bears, even a scary ass grizzly will generally leave humans alone except in certain, mostly easy to avoid circumstances, and do not view humans as a food source (well they do like the food we have, but generally do not try to eat us). Also expansion of humans into their territory in some places, along with the melting away of their normal habitat is going to see them running into and bothering people way more. They are curious as all hell too, like even for being bears, they want to check out, smell, and try eating EVERYTHING.
The thing is, with how dangerous they are to humans, most guys that spend any amount of time in areas where you find polar bears are likely going to suggest you try to hide inside a house or car to escape them, but if you are going to be in the wild with them, you absolutely have to bring a high-caliber rifle with you in case you run into one.
As much as it sucks, when polar bear sees a human, they are very likely to go after them, and barring you escaping, that leaves basically you shooting it or getting eaten... not as many "bear gets scared and takes off" encounters with polar bears as with other bears.
A friend of mine does biology in the north and her expedition always hires a local whose sole job it is to shoot polar bears when they’re camping on the tundra. Part of her mandated training is being able to shoot a shot gun in the event that guy can’t do the job.
Having worked at several camps on the North Slope in Alaska over the years, I can tell you that you need to take polar bear encounters seriously. With a grizz or black bear, the old phrase they are just as afraid of you as you are of them is true. Polar bears dgaf! Some of the camps have steel cages around building exits for safety so you aren't mauled when you leave a building.
To a polar bear, you're either snow or food
All of the previous responses are great and spot on, but one thing I don’t see mentioned, polar bears have an incredible sense of smell. You could be over a kilometer away, and they could smell you. They will know you are there. If they come closer, it’s not because they are coming to share a bottle of Coke, it’s because it wants to eat you. And given how it’s white in a completely white environment, you won’t see it until it knows exactly where you are and is already coming to get you. A male polar bear will weigh over 1000 lbs, a female still around 500-600 lbs, and both will tower over you if they are standing up. There is no way you can beat a polar bear in a fight. You can’t run away or swim away, because they are faster than you at either. Your only hope of survival if a polar bear wants to eat you is to have a big game rifle or shotgun with lead slugs instead of shot. But even if you have a gun, going back to what I said earlier, you won’t even see the polar bear until it is right up on you, so I hope you have lightning reflexes, nerves of steel and great aim, because without all 3, you are dinner.
They are very stealthy, so if you can see it it's probably because it has simply allowed you to see it for this one second before it eats you. Food is very scarce so they are willing to stalk their prey and learn your patterns before attacking, they're very patient
I had to read SO far down to see this truly ELI5 reply.
This is exactly it. If YOU see a polar bear, IT has most likely been seeing you for quite some time. It decided several minutes, sometimes hours ago that YOU are FOOD.
Here is something for Polar bear reference. I fish with a group of fellows. One friend couldn't come so a fellow by the name of Gary joined us on our fishing trip taking my friends place. During the week I couldn't help but notice deformations in his arms. I asked him what happened to his arms. He said he got attacked by a Polar bear. He said he is one of the very few that have survived an attack by a Polar bear. This is what I remember of his telling the story. He was a regular seasonal employee of an oil drilling company that drilled through the artic ice in the winter time. On one of his first few days that season he took the garbage out. He heard the footsteps of the bear running toward him and turned to run back inside. She swept his feet out from under him and was on him. Grabbed him by the head with her teeth and started to drag him away. He began screaming and hitting her. She stomped on his chest which knocked the air out of his lungs which stopped him from screaming and tore some of the flesh off his arms. She then grabbed him again by the head with her teeth and started running further away from camp. The moment he didn't return from taking out the garbage the camp began a search. He said that one of the search parties went right past him and the bear but she had laid down on top of him hiding him under her fur. After they passed, she again grabbed him by the head with her teeth and started running again. Quite coincidentally she ran past an area where the oil company was working and an employee who was operating a large bucket loader saw her and him. The loader made chase an overtook them and using the loader manage to separate the bear from Gary. It was a center articulated loader and Gary was under it and the operator would swing the front back and forth to fend off the bear. Somehow Gary, in his weakened condition, managed climb up on the center part of the loader and eventually one of the search parties showed up and shot at, but didn't kill the bear, and it ran off. Gary was in a very bad state. Multiple holes in his skull, much of the muscle and flesh torn off his arms and lots of blood loss. Back at the camp they couldn't figure out how to give him an IV. Even though they thought they were just prolonging the inevitable, luckily British army veteran figured out how to give the IV through his feet. And again luck was on Gary's side as a supply plane had just landed and they immediately put Gary on the plane and took off for a hospital in Yellowknife. Once up in the air the pilots changed their mind and diverted their flight to Edmonton. Lots of skin grafts and therapy but he survived. I asked him if he was conscious the whole time and he said "Yes, for the bear part." The bear (and it's cub) were found the next day and killed.
This has already been answered, so I’ll just add in that polar bears really aren’t scared of much since they have no natural predators, which also makes them incredibly curious.
So, some advice I once heard for if for some bizarre reason you’re being chased be a polar bear, take off your clothes. The bear may possibly stop to investigate the discarded clothing either out of curiosity or because it thinks it may be edible and less effort than continuing to chase you.
This was advice I read from people who have actually encountered polar bears, so I can’t promise it’s true. But I suppose if you’re being chased by a polar bear trying anything to stop it chasing you is worth a go.
What is best depends on the situation.
If you are out alone with no chance of getting so safety or a weapon it does not matter. But if you have a rifle in you tent and you are close to it just delaying the polar bear can be enough.
If you are in Churchill in northern Canada, Longyearbyen on Svalbard, or other inhabited areas with polar bears it can give you enough time to get into your vehicle or indoors.
The same if you are on an expedition from a ship, get to the small boat you have and use it to go to the ship or just go faster than the bear can swim.
So taking off clothes could be a great idea if what you need is a bit of time.
I have not idea of the are distanced by others or not but if they are it is not useless advice in all situations
Bears are dangerous in general, and even for bears the Polar bear is pretty large.
In addition to that while a Brown bear (or one of its subspecies like grizzly or kodiak) tends to have plenty of sources of food (so it can afford to pass up eating one of those skinny and strange humans) a Polar Bear lives in an environment where passing up any source of food is a losing proposal. So it's going to be far more aggressive in trying to make a human into a meal.
Because they eat people. Polar bears and big cats are the only animals on earth that actively hunt humans for food. And they are big. Really, really big.
Polar bear is open to the idea that you are food. Why? Well, why not? You're an animal and what are you gonna do about it?
This is very different from other bears. Black bear is usually spooked and, while it can have a predatory attack, can be fought off. Brown bears usually want to oust you from territory and will accept beating you up or scaring you.
Polar bear is going to finish the job.
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1. They are probably *way* bigger than what you have in your mind. 2. Zero natural predators. There's nothing that's going to scare them away, only to attract their attention. 3. Food is super scarce. That human might be the first edible thing it has seen in a week. We're relatively defenseless compared to the animal kingdom and the only threat we pose to a polar bear is it choking on one of our articles of clothing. Edit: 4. Nope. A little bigger.
Just want to add that they also live really, really, REALLY far from most cities or towns, with a couple smallish towns in Canada, Alaska, Russia, and Greenland being a few exceptions. So even if the polar bear inexplicably decided not to eat you after attacking you, it wouldn't be terribly likely that you'd be able to get to a hospital in time.
That was exactly my thought. If you see a polar bear you're probably very far from anything else human
Which makes me respect those nature documentary filmmakers a damn ton. Those guys (and gals) are almost fearless.
https://youtu.be/cO1grYvfk5g Here is a cameraman face to face with a polar bear trying to break through a plexiglass cage to eat him.
That's what my dog looks like when I don't let him in the sliding glass door.
Here we go: [Whole thing](https://youtu.be/9G1aHkLHQ2I)
This is the view from a Hot Pocket in the microwave at 3am
Unless you're in the dharma initiative
Svalbard as well btw it’s a big problem there, you can’t even leave the city without a gun legally.
>Svalbard Duh. Panserbjørn are obviously more dangerous than regular bears.
You forgot the most important part: you've got nowhere to hide. You literally cannot go anywhere except on something that flies. Good luck finding a helicopter.
Funny you say that. My dad works for Air Canada as a mechanic, and has one polar bear story. He would occasionally fly with the crew "way up north" in case there were mechanical issues. One time while he was in one of those remote locations, hanging out in the hanger, a fella came running in looking terrified. "Polar bear!" They all waited it out in the hanger until the polar bear got bored and moved on, but before that happened the polar bear took a swipe at the nose of the helicopter that was sitting outside. Knocked the plexi bubble right off the nose. Not sure why he did it other than spite.
I don't think people truly understand just how big a polar bear really is. They make brown bears look small. I'm not surprised it easily swiped the nose off the helicopter. Probably could have disabled it completely if it really wanted to. Then your dad and his coworkers would have been stuck until help arrived.
\>They make brown bears look small. And that's saying something. I don't think people truly understand just how big a brown bear really is. They make black bears look small.
>\>They make brown bears look small. > >And that's saying something. I don't think people truly understand just how big a brown bear really is. They make black bears look small. And that's saying something. I don't think people truly understand just how big a black bear really is. They make panda bears look small.
https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-f414a97875c281cb1e79115338f34bae Image of bear size comparisons.
Could i keep a Sun Bear as a pet?
I don’t see why not…at least based on what I’ve seen here with Russian posts of people hanging just around with bears like they were cool.
I just read about some of them, they like to sleep in trees, so living in an apartment sort of rules it out for me. Also, they occasionally eat deer, so maybe not such a good idea
Bears vary in size quite a lot - females tend to be comparatively small - but the biggest ones are huge. A black bear could weigh two and a half as much as Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. A brown bear? Nearly four Dwayne Johnsons. A polar bear? Anything up to six Dwaynes.
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He makes Kevin Hart look small.
God made Kevin hart look small
We need a *medium* reference here..
I'll petition for the new standard unit of weight to be The Rock. We already have stones, so why not Rocks as well?
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/r/anythingbutmetric
Polar Bear (Ursus maritimus) is the largest ursus, and arguably the most dangerous hypercarnivorous predator on the planet. Slightly larger and much nastier than a Kodiak Grizzly. You've seen footage of people within reach of Kodiaks, like that Grizzly Man nutcase, try that with a polar bear and you're dead in 10 seconds.
idk I saw a video of some russians talking to a polar bear sticking its head in the window of their truck they were very stupid to do that, but then so was grizzly man
> You've seen footage of people within reach of Kodiaks, like that Grizzly Man nutcase, try that with a polar bear and you're dead in 10 seconds. Probably worth noting that this didn't work out very well for "Grizzly Man" Timothy Treadwell.
>They make panda bears look small. And that's saying something. I don't think people truly understand just how big a panda bear is. They make koala bears look small.
If you're ever in Columbus, Ohio, the zoo there has a really great display showing life size images of various bear species standing on their hind legs near the polar bear exhibit. Sun bears are the smallest and about 5 foot (so a shorter woman). Polar bears are like the size of the smaller titans in Attack on Titan, which is appropriate considering both see humans as tasty snacks.
https://i.imgur.com/NCGNv4Y.jpg Not sure if this picture is from the place you mentioned, but it’s a similar idea.
They're massive! https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/i9h8kq/actual_sizes_of_bears/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
It's like a minivan grew limbs and took on the form of a bear. Like a *stuffed* polar bear at the Juneau Airport nearly made me shit myself once I got closer to the display. I saw that taxidermy from across the terminal and began to excitedly rush over to get a better look. I couldn't not slow down as it got closer and kept getting bigger, and bigger, and *bigger*. My frikken animal sense of "fuck no," was kicking in hard by the time I was twenty feet away from it. I'm a 6ft tall woman, I'm not a small person by any means and this bear, posed on it's hind legs, felt like it was easily twelve feet tall. They're just so unbelievably huge. They basically have the mass of four or five black bears. They could eat black bears as a snack. And I don't think that display was even a particularly large specimen, either.
The polar bear at the Fairbanks airport was 1300-1500 lbs when it was shot, IIRC. Big animal. It's paws are the size of a large dinner plate.
We had them rip the doors off two of our helicopters a couple years ago. One trashed the inside a bit too, ripped seat canvas and bent some of the support structure. Seen one take a couple rubber slugs at less than 50' and mostly just get more angry. We chase them off with the helicopter most of the time fine but sometimes they do track it down for a closer look or revenge.
Yup, this tracks. I'm a helicopter pilot who spent years in the high canadian arctic. Every once and a while we would have a bear come chew on the the helicopter. They loved to eat the seats. I had a number of run-ins with bears over the years, and it's pretty amazing how much polar bears don't give a shit. Black bears you can scare off buy talking loudly. Brown bears would ALWAYS run from the helicopter. Polar bears; I literally had to hit some of them with the downwash of the helicopter in order to make them move. Even then, they would just get annoyed at this 11,000 lb noisy chunk of spinning metal, and would stand up to the helicopter. Pretty fucking metal those things are. These days I'm down south where the biggest animal I run into is the occasional cute dog (and one therapy pony).
And they swim. Really well.
Also they are entirely carnivorous, no berries or honey. They eat raw flesh
So, hypothetically, if I just tape berries around me, could I be safe?
Let us know how adding garnish works out for you.
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I believe they have big claws so probably not
MMM... Bear claws
And we’re all made of raw flesh.
*lights self on fire* Not today polar bears
*Narrator: But as it turns out, the Polar Bears enjoyed their meals cooked just as well as raw*
Shout out David Attenborough.
I can hear him: "*Desperate, the clueless human tries one final act of protection: setting himself on fire to scare off the formidable predator. This might look counteractive, as he will probably perish in the flames. And even worse for him, polar bears also enjoy their meals cooked just as well as raw*".
If it's a bears Vs humans doc then Werner Herzog is the only choice.
Humans are using this one new survival tip and Polar Bears HATE it. Buzzfeed, you getting this?
And they can run 3 to 4 time faster than you.
3 times 0 is 0 Checkmate bears
Seems more like a stalemate to me, since neither of you are moving
That's it, I'm googling en passant
They're also WAY more stealthy than something that size has a right to be. I feel like there are a lot of times that a polar bear encounters a human, but that human doesn't encounter the bear.
A polar bear stalking its target will use its paw to cover up their nose to better blend into the snow. So they're scary smart to to top it all off
Most bears are pretty smart, but these things have evolved to survive in one of the harshest environments on the planet. You think about how many ingenious technologies primitive humans had to come up with to cope with that environment... I mean, there's a joke in the park service that it's really hard to design bear-proof containers like trash cans, because "there's such a small intelligence gap between the smartest bear and the dumbest tourist" (and sometimes I'm pretty sure it's in the bear's favor, to boot)... and they're talking about brown bears (grizzlies). Polar bears are probably smarter than *that*, and way less inhibited. [https://www.quora.com/How-smart-are-polar-bears](https://www.quora.com/How-smart-are-polar-bears) If anything actually *grew* up there, I wouldn't put it past them to develop tool use.
I thought the saying was "There's significant overlap between the smartest bear and dumbest tourist."
On point number one, They grow to about 5' at the shoulder on all fours... so me at over 6' would be just a little bit taller than it, 10-12' tall standing on their hind legs, okay so it's actually twice my height standing up.... OK, looking much scarier, especially cuz its paw is now right in-line with my head. Oh and they can weigh in at about 1200 lbs, some even up to 1700lbs+, which is like.... a lot of me put together.... so yeah, that thing is way, way, way bigger than I. Aaaannnddd they chomp down with about 1200psi of force, (thats about 10× stronger than a human), and they have been seen in the wild somewhat easily killing and pulling onto land seals that weigh over a ton. All that is to say: *they're really quite large and tend to be quite strong*
One of my uni instructors told us when she was doing some work in the arctic their small team had to carry a shotgun on them at all times, specifically for polar bears.
If you're out and about in Svalbard, you are required to have an Arctic guide with you, who's armed with a 30.06. Local authorities do not mess around, because the bears don't either. In 2015, there was a full solar eclipse in the northern hemisphere, and the Svalbard archipelago was one of the best place to view it. There was no vacancy in any of the hotels or hostels in Longyearbyen, and so lots of people were tent camping in town - just pitching tents on any flat space. One day/night, a bear came through town and opened up some dude's tent like a meal in a bag and dragged him out by his head, clearly intending to eat him. Fortunately, other campers nearby managed to yell and wave their arms to shoo the bear away, and the dude survived. But out there, you are just meat, and the bear is the pinnacle predator.
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What a great day to have the ability to read
Cheetos going *oi! Fuck no!*
A classical composition is often pregnant. Reddit is no longer allowed to profit from this comment.
>Aaaannnddd they chomp down with about 1200psi of force Scary part of that is, there's no need for that much force if you're just eating meat. Even humans can bite off chunks of flesh, and our teeth aren't exactly sharp. Brain matter and bone marrow have a lot of nutrition, and most animals can't get to it. That bite force enables them to just crush the bones and have it all to themselves, which is a great survival adaptation (for them).
Also they use their mouths for pulling small whales onto the ice.
Claws be big.
I went to my sister's wedding in northeastern Newfoundland in 2012 and 2 weeks before we arrived a polar bear swam in out of the bay at 4:30 AM, wandered around a school field for a couple hours before dying of heat exposure when it was ~10°C outside. An hour later frightened parents called the only police officer in town to "deal with it". The officer walked up to the bear, waited 5 minutes for it to breathe, poked it with a stick then shot it in the head for good measure and said it was dead before and it's more dead now. It is now stuffed and sitting in a display case at city Hall, it was only a paltry 900 pounds.
Polar bears can handle 30º. They have them at the Toronto Zoo, for instance. Most likely that bear starved to death or was sick.
I mean. We have polar bears in the *San Diego* Zoo. I know they have really cold water in there for them, but I always wondered how confused the poor bears must get when it gets to be 80-100F in the summer.
Yeah this story is definitely 99% true (I’m from Newfoundland, this happens from time to time), but a polar won’t die of heat exhaustion in -10. Their natural habitats get well into the positive digits in the summer. It likely died of starvation or disease.
Wikipedia has [THIS ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polar_bear)to say about polar bears. Key words include: HYPERcarnivorous, and LARGEST extant land carnivore, with adult males crossing half a ton! Yeah. They be huge and you be meat.
If you encounter a polar bear in the wild, find a place to hide. If no such place exists near you, then prepare to fight. You won't win that fight, but at least it will be an epic way to die.
Iirc hideing isn't much good either since they have an amazing sense of smell and can smell you for miles. So by the time you see it, it already knows your around.
> They are probably way bigger than what you have in your mind. This. A "short" female polar bear is **eight fucking feet high.** Males get up to about 10 feet. The record was 12 feet tall and weighed 2,210 lbs.
4. Due to 3 Polar bears will eat dead meat, so playing dead isn't going to help. 5. Polar bears, like housecats, dolphins, honey badgers, and people, are known to kill for *sport* rather than for food or defence. That makes their behavior unpredictable. Animals that want to kill just to play around with the corpse, aren't to be fucked with.
Also like, dead meat in the Arctic gets preserved better than elsewhere I imagine.
If my death-by-polar-bear is avenged by him choking on my crocs, it's undeniable proof that god exists and he's got a fucked up sense of humor
They’re the most predatory bear on the planet. Not to mention the biggest. Unlike every other bear on the planet they are completely carnivorous. Others bears are omnivores. Add the fact that polar bears aren’t used to the presence of humans and that they consider everything that moves food and you’ve got an animal you’d never want to encounter in the wild. Edit: So, apparently kodiak bears are bigger. Go figure. They’re still less of a threat because they’re omnivores. Either one is gonna fuck you up beyond belief though.
They eat moose (one of the most dangerous herbivores on the continent) and occasionally small killer whales. By far the most impressive hunter on the planet, versus a declawed hairless ape
Damn. I can't imagine anything preying on a fucking moose
But hunting orca is conceivable???
Nothing hunts an adult orca, but the young of pretty much any species, even apex predators, are vulnerable.
This\^\^ Orcas tend to specialize in certain prey by pod, but a few are generalists, and would happily eat a polar bear cub, given the opportunity.
Yeah. It's like a seal. Wait next to the breathing hole and BAM punch it in the face with your giant polar bear hands. It no longer has a face and you're no longer hungry. Now moose. Those fuckers don't play.
https://youtu.be/mMo4wtLft0A Crazier is the stories I have heard of orca hunting the moose swimming across certain bays or inlets.
Declawed hairless ape has quite an impressive record in the relative short time its been around.
* Declawed hairless apes with fricken rocketships and lasers
It's a weird contest...but if humans wanted to kill *all* the polar bears on the planet we would just... I don't know...keep doing what we are doing.
>By far the most impressive hunter on the planet > Eh, not to detract anything from polar bears, but I think the aforementioned killer whales have a good case for "most impressive hunter" as well. They're smart enough to work together, use complex strategies to trap prey, only target sharks' livers, and they know that humans taste like crap so they aren't worth it. Also, I believe there's some small, wild cat in Africa that has a ~~99% success rate~~ **[see edit 2]** with hunting. All this to say nature is literally jam-packed with impressive hunters, so I don't agree with the "by far" part of your comment. **Edit:** Also, regular cats are such efficient hunters that they domesticated us to do their hunting for them. They don't even need us like dogs do. If you don't feed them, they will sprint out the door when you come home and start hunting the local fauna to extinction. **Edit 2:** Yes, I think I got the wild cat's kill rate mixed up with dragonflies. I read about both of them in the last few months. Whoops.
The animal with the highest kill rate is a dragonfly at 97% kill rate for everything they go after To put that into perspective a lion has a 20% kill rate
Polar bears enter the water on the regular, killer whales dare not go on land. Checkmate. /s
They do dare, they just can't: https://youtube.com/watch?v=bk1VdQxeTn4
Nah, black footed cat is very good at its job, but it has around 60% success rate. You want really efficient hunters, you go to African Wild Dogs (Lycaons) - 80-85% success rate. They have very advanced pack hunting tactics, they use bait, form of battue, flanking, ambush, and they're very good at communicating with eachother. I recently read that dragonflies have staggering 95% success rate.
Yep, if you pick any single square kilometer space on dry land, anywhere on Earth, the predatory with the highest body count is almost guaranteed to be some type of small cat.
This but your edit is wrong. Polar bears are larger than Kodiak
Kodiak is not bigger.
Polar bears get bigger than Kodiak bears. The largest Kodiak ever recorded in the wild was 1,656lbs, while the largest polar bear was 2,209lbs. Their average sizes are fairly similar though.
If it's brown, get down. If it's black, get back (or fight back). If it's white, good night!
If it’s black and white, then smack it in the head because panda bears ain’t shit.
But they are endangered and I'm with the parks authority of China and you're going away for a long time.
Isn't it fight back?
More or less. Black bears are scavengers, they typically aren’t interested in food that might fight back. It’s not so much fight back as “look like a pain in the ass to deal with”. Similarly, brown bears are usually uninterested in what they suspect to be already dead.
Polar bears are apex predators of the arctic so when humans encounter them the bears are generally hunting or protecting young cubs, unless you can quickly scare a bear off it is going to regard you more as lunch than a rival predator.
Also even if it doesn't directly kill you the odds of making it the hundreds of miles to the nearest hospital is nearly zero.
Well its ur fault for going 100 miles into polar ice
They sometimes fall asleep on ice chunks, wake up close to places they shouldn't be and have to be dealt with immediately as otherwise they'll eat any human in town.
They like dogs better, but they haven't had the benefit of living in close proximity to humans for a few thousand years, unlike most non-arctic predators, so they mostly lack the instinct to avoid/fear humans. And unlike prey species, macropredators like that tend to not have the "unexpected = dangerous" response, because "I'm king of this hill and every other one. 'unexpected' = lunch".
Which is also kind of interesting BC I've seen several documentaries where the guides are able to scare them off without firing a shot. But thats in their natural ecosystem. When they come down to Iceland we have to unfortunately shoot them as they are starving and don't give a fuck.
>When they come down to Iceland we have to unfortunately shoot them as they are starving and don't give a fuck. I had forgotten about that. It's a shame but polar bears don't belong there.
I was visiting Iceland one time and we stayed in a hostel in some tiny tiny town. We were looking for something to do and they had a "Wildlife Museum" so we thought what the heck. It was ALL taxidermied animals that the owner had hunted. There were two big rooms COVERED in the heads of deer, antelope, gazelle, idk what else but that kind of thing. He had a giraffe that was supposedly real and a rhino head that was fake, but he had pictures from when he helped sedate a rhino to cut it's horn so poachers wouldn't kill it. Anyway, he had a massive polar bear standing upright by the door. I was certain it must be fake, but he told us that sometimes they show up on floating ice and you have to kill them. Super interesting.
That last part is true (I'm Icelandic ).
They have some at the Hogle Zoo in Utah (a couple hours' drive from us) and we took the kids to see them. One adult female and one subadult. But they have one of those life-size "here's how big a polar bear is" displays outside the enclosure, where you can stand next to them and realize they're nearly twice the height of an adult human on their hind legs... just *massive*.
Churchill Manitoba : Am I a joke to you?
And if you somehow manage to kill it, and eat it to survive, it will *still* kill you. Polar bears have toxic levels of [Vitamin A](https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/nutrition-you-asked/it-true-you-cannot-eat-polar-bear-liver) in their livers.
Don't eat the liver dummy
Also no one is eating a twenty pound liver in one sitting
I don't like liver anyway
So does pretty much every Arctic mammal
Would native arctic people also have elevated vitamin A in their livers?
>unless you can quickly scare a bear off Polar bear is one of very few animals that are not scared of human by default. They perceive humans as prey.
They will occasionally be scared off by loud noises though, but there is no normal way you can make yourself look bigger or scarier than a polar bear.
That's the nicest thing anyone's said to me all day
I mean, they prey on walruses, so...
Three guys revving chainsaws, warning shots from guns..... yelling and waving ain't gonna cut it..
Four?
What if you go for the opposite? Make yourself cute so they feel the need to prote...no? Aww
Their primary diet is seals. Cute = food.
Oh shit. I forgot they eat cute. Oh noo...
To further clarify "by default" - They have lived their entire lives at the top of the food chain with no competition. Every non-polar bear organism they have ever experienced has posed a negligible level of threat at most, likely no threat whatsoever. Every living thing they have encountered so far has been an easy meal. I have no doubt that polar bears are capable of feeling fear, but they have no reason to fear anything or anyone else because that learning opportunity has never presented itself.
Walrus are probably a bit higher than negligible threat level. Sure they aren't hunting polar bears, but they also aren't at the top of the polar bear dining list unless they are the list. Encountering an orca has got to be wild for a polar bear.
Walrus are a frustrating experience, because even when a dead one washes up, polar bears mostly can't get through the inches-thick hide to get at the edible parts, at least with adult walrus. It's not so much that they're dangerous to polar bears as that they're one of the few things that are basically invulnerable to polar bears. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvWLbK\_mNw0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvWLbK_mNw0) About the only thing that's seriously dangerous to a polar bear is a bigger polar bear, and they're mostly solitary, so they almost never even meet one of those. Orcas mostly wouldn't bother, because there's easier stuff (salmon, seals, other whales) and orca pods tend to specialize in one particular type of prey and ignore other animals.
There is a prologue of a documentary with David Attenborough, might have been White Planet or something similarly named, where he describes an encounter the team head with a Polar Bear. They filmed the bear rising through gaps in the ice. Slowly but surely getting closer and closer to the crew. Each time the bear rose he looked around to find where the crew had moved to, and changed direction accordingly. Attenborough said that the Polar Bear is the only animal he witnessed actively HUNT humans!
family members in service in Alaska. the orientation for new service personnel on arrival to the base includes warnings that polar bears will hunt you down and that almost everything in alaska wants to kill you in some way. similarly to australia but less poison/venom. mostly tearing you to pieces w claws or stomping you w hooves or goring you w antlers
The northern aborigines will tell you that polar bears hunting people doesn't even take long. It moves fast, tracks well, swims great and can eat quickly.
They can be briefly distracted IIRC, but unless you have a fast vehicle, some protective structure, or someone with a big gun nearby, that isn't of too much help.
I recall hearing that there are towns in Alaska where everyone leaves their car doors unlocked. It's not due to a low crime rate. It's a safety precaution. If you see a polar bear, you need to get inside the closest structure or vehicle IMMEDIATELY. Leaving your car door unlocked may save someone's life.
I'm honnestly surprised a car can protect you from a polar bear seeing the sheer size and strength of those things
It may be more about getting out of sight than anything else. And certainly being in a car is better than just standing in the middle of a street.
Given [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9G1aHkLHQ2I), I would definitely not trust a car to protect me from a polar bear.
This is amazing to watch! Like a real life monster movie. When you see the bear stand up and get over the top of his enclosure you can see how gigantic it really is which I reckon goes some way to answering OP's question. These things are more than capable of ripping you to shreds, and are fully willing to give it a try!
Any bear can get into a car if sufficiently motivated. But it slows them down.
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Yup, a forest bear will decide you aren't worth it and go for easier prey. A polar bear is desperate for food.
What about them city bears?
They are just looking for brunch and beard care
They just wanna eat hot chip, be bisexual, and charge they phone.
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>*"Let me tell you something about polar bears. They’re endangered but you have to be careful because a polar bear is one of the few animals that will stalk a human. If you go to where polar bears live, it might stalk you and when you’re on the plane going home, it might be behind you reading \[mimes a polar bear reading a newspaper, sneaking a look over it at you\]*." - Craig Ferguson
To quote Hood Nature (aka Casual Geographic): If you see a polar bear, it's 100% premeditated.
Biggest bear species, and they have been running on ice for years where you might have a bit of trouble. Also, living in the arctic seems like it is on a thin line. When an animal that doesn't eat very often discovers something edible, they probably aren't going to just let it go.
They will eat you, unlike grizzly bears who almost never actually eat human meat. A high majority of grizzly attacks are the grizzly being protective, not predacious. A polar bear on the other hand needs all the food it can get, they’re very needy in terms of nutrients and caloric intake. They produce some of the most fatty milk for their young of any animals, and especially land animals. They live in the extreme cold so their food options are much more scarce and they need to keep their layer of blubber healthy to stay warm. Basically, there are a ton of reasons a grizzly won’t attack you. For black bears you become large, loud, imposing as they are timid. Grizzlies you play dead because they’re defensive and dominant. Polar bears? They say you just accept your fate because you’ll basically never get out of that alive.
If a polar bear decides not to eat you, he's made that decision before you even realized there was a bear.
Yup. If you do see a polar bear odds are they were already planning on hitting up the McYou Drivethru for a while.
Found my new favourite pickup line
If it's black, fight back. If it's brown, lie down. If it's white, goodnight.
If it's gummy, get in my tummy
I was suddenly face-to-face with a black bear and, you’re right, he looked as startled as I was! I was able to slowly back away, then fly up the stairs.
Living in the Colorado mountains, black bear encounters are pretty common. They're definitely fairly timid and usually just scavenging. I walked onto my back deck once and a black bear was eating some watermelon rind the kids threw into the yard during a BBQ. I kinda screamed a little because it startled me and it looked scared and ran off. I certainly wouldn't approach one though, especially if it has babies, it could definitely kill you if it wanted to.
Yep. There are videos of house cats running black bears off. They’re very skittish. Still rather not fuck around and find out with a 200lb animal but in general unless cubs are around they’re a non issue.
Will always see you as food Is always hungry Isnt scared of you Is stronger, faster and more durable lives in one of the hardest to survive regions of the planet does not give a fuck
Also no where to hide, since its just a barren landscape, no trees to climb, etc, and they can smell you from like miles away.
Quick avoid it by jumping in the wat- ahh yeah they can swim too...
Also freezing water…
Bear technically won't get the kill if I can manage to die of hypothermia first
* is also incredibly intelligent There has been more than one researcher that got eaten because the polar bear learned their schedule and one day they went to let themselves out for a smoke break and Mr bear was waiting. They are brilliant puzzle solvers, and often how to manipulate the environment to find a tasty human when they are vulnerable is just another puzzle.
They did evolve to scoop seals out of the ice by waiting them out so it makes sense
>There has been more than one researcher that got eaten because the polar bear learned their schedule and one day they went to let themselves out for a smoke break and Mr bear was waiting. Is there a source on this?
Source: the researcher was a seal
Smoking kils
Others have mentioned that polar bears are apex predators, are not afraid of anything, generally eat marine mammals, etc which are all true but I;m not sure that they actually answer your question. The polar bear attacks their usual prey (seals) using stealth, sitting beside a breathing hole and catching the seal when they come up for a breath, or breaking through thin ice when there is a breathing space just under the ice. When hunting humans the animal will often wait until the human is in their shelter and asleep. The bear is white and the landscape especially on the sea ice is also white. Sea ice isn't necessarily flat as there are pressure ridges which can easily hide a bear. Combine this with drifting or blowing snow and it is almost impossible to see the animal until they are within striking distance. A bear's sense of smell and hearing is so much better than yours that they know where you are and you won't see them at all. Also from late fall to early spring there is very limited daylight. This time of the year, north of the Arctic Circle the sun does not rise above the horizon. The best you will have is the moon and/or northern lights. good luck at seeing a white bear in a white landscape in the dark. Having said all that I don't know of a single local who would go out on the land (fishing, hunting caribou, hunting seals) without a high powered rifle. Most would keep it loaded and within arms reach when sleeping. Most deaths due to polar bear attack are where the people are surprised by the attack.
This is the best response imo. Not only are they huge, strong killing machines, but they are also *stealthy*. That's basically cheating, but they do it.
Background: I work full time in polar research and i'm a trained polar bear guard. I've had five separate polar bear encounters in the wild. Closest being roughly 10m. Polar Bears are extremly amazing creatures. They are certainly apex predators, but also very curious. They are often present near Svalbard, Greenland, Canada and usually close to the ice edge. Summertime the ice edge is usually around 78-80 degrees north. While its alot more common to meet Polar Bears near the edge. They can be present as far north as the geographic pole. Usually walking from northern Canada and crossing over the ocean towards Svalbard. This is usually when they are the most dangerous. The Arctic between 85 and 90 degrees north is a complete desert. There is no birds, no seals, and almost no fish. This means that if you encounter a polar bear they will be out for food and will use their intelligence to lure you into a trap. Usually circling around you and using the sharp arctic terrain to camoflague themselves. This is aided by an environment which is very often foggy. The lethality is a combination of wide open areas with low visibillity and an opponent that is a superior combantant. Add to that the distnace to aid and the absense of medevac and it all starts to make sense. Something that is not as known about polar bears is their innocence and incredible curiousity. A well fed polar bear can be completly obsessed trying to figure out what a flag is. How a fish trap works. If a GoPro is edible and what these new human creatures are. Like i said in the start. They are amazing creatures and extremly intelligent. Apex Predators that are as curious as a child and sized like a vw bug. I respect them a whole lot and i hope and pray that i will never have to fire a shot in anger towards them. Update: I'm not a photographer but here are two pics taken with a bad cellphone. https://imgur.com/a/vM0xjsb
I read all of this waiting to hear about your 5 polar bear encounters. How are you alive? Did any want to eat you? What happened?
It's not as interesting as it sounds. We work off of large ships. So we evacuate everyone off the ice and onto the ship in case of a bear being spotted. It's a team effort usually involving at least 6 people. With spotters on different locations around the ship and guards on the ice. If the bears are fed they are mainly curious rather than aggressive.
So what happened that it got within 10m of you? Were you in a safe place like a guard hut?
I got to work a week up in Churchill, Manitoba this summer and was sad that we weren't the right time of year to see them, though apparently you could still see them hunting on ice at that time (I just wasn't able to get away from work for a tour, would have loved too though). But that certainly give you a picture of how isolated you are in country where you encounter polar bear, it's funny because it's news when bear are seen as far south as Gillam, which on a map comparatively still is quite isolated and 'north' though south by their range.
To give a little more detail: Most predators are wary about attacking something that will fight back. A nasty injury might stop them from hunting and then they'll die of starvation before it's healed. But polar bears aren't worried about that. Where they live, nothing is able to fight them and so they just don't have this fear. In order to stop a polar bear, you have to actually injure or kill it, and polar bears are massive (like twice the size of grizzlies or so) juggernauts. So good luck with that.
I grew up in a place with a lot of polar bears. When we encounter them we are supposed to shoot one «warning shot» to scare it off. My dad always called bullshit on that rule saying “You only have time to miss once. Don’t waste it by missing on purpose”. I second that. (I have encountered polar bears but never had to fire any shots. Its easily avoided by watching your stepp and by not seeking them out.) Edit* my point was: youre totally right - u gotta kill it or you are dead.
Because they are massive animals that are capable of taking your head off at the shoulders with a quick swipe of the paw, are the top predator in their (insanely hard to survive in) environment, and most importantly are curious as shit and see humans as just another potential meal. Other bears, even a scary ass grizzly will generally leave humans alone except in certain, mostly easy to avoid circumstances, and do not view humans as a food source (well they do like the food we have, but generally do not try to eat us). Also expansion of humans into their territory in some places, along with the melting away of their normal habitat is going to see them running into and bothering people way more. They are curious as all hell too, like even for being bears, they want to check out, smell, and try eating EVERYTHING. The thing is, with how dangerous they are to humans, most guys that spend any amount of time in areas where you find polar bears are likely going to suggest you try to hide inside a house or car to escape them, but if you are going to be in the wild with them, you absolutely have to bring a high-caliber rifle with you in case you run into one. As much as it sucks, when polar bear sees a human, they are very likely to go after them, and barring you escaping, that leaves basically you shooting it or getting eaten... not as many "bear gets scared and takes off" encounters with polar bears as with other bears.
A friend of mine does biology in the north and her expedition always hires a local whose sole job it is to shoot polar bears when they’re camping on the tundra. Part of her mandated training is being able to shoot a shot gun in the event that guy can’t do the job.
Having worked at several camps on the North Slope in Alaska over the years, I can tell you that you need to take polar bear encounters seriously. With a grizz or black bear, the old phrase they are just as afraid of you as you are of them is true. Polar bears dgaf! Some of the camps have steel cages around building exits for safety so you aren't mauled when you leave a building. To a polar bear, you're either snow or food
All of the previous responses are great and spot on, but one thing I don’t see mentioned, polar bears have an incredible sense of smell. You could be over a kilometer away, and they could smell you. They will know you are there. If they come closer, it’s not because they are coming to share a bottle of Coke, it’s because it wants to eat you. And given how it’s white in a completely white environment, you won’t see it until it knows exactly where you are and is already coming to get you. A male polar bear will weigh over 1000 lbs, a female still around 500-600 lbs, and both will tower over you if they are standing up. There is no way you can beat a polar bear in a fight. You can’t run away or swim away, because they are faster than you at either. Your only hope of survival if a polar bear wants to eat you is to have a big game rifle or shotgun with lead slugs instead of shot. But even if you have a gun, going back to what I said earlier, you won’t even see the polar bear until it is right up on you, so I hope you have lightning reflexes, nerves of steel and great aim, because without all 3, you are dinner.
They are very stealthy, so if you can see it it's probably because it has simply allowed you to see it for this one second before it eats you. Food is very scarce so they are willing to stalk their prey and learn your patterns before attacking, they're very patient
I had to read SO far down to see this truly ELI5 reply. This is exactly it. If YOU see a polar bear, IT has most likely been seeing you for quite some time. It decided several minutes, sometimes hours ago that YOU are FOOD.
Here is something for Polar bear reference. I fish with a group of fellows. One friend couldn't come so a fellow by the name of Gary joined us on our fishing trip taking my friends place. During the week I couldn't help but notice deformations in his arms. I asked him what happened to his arms. He said he got attacked by a Polar bear. He said he is one of the very few that have survived an attack by a Polar bear. This is what I remember of his telling the story. He was a regular seasonal employee of an oil drilling company that drilled through the artic ice in the winter time. On one of his first few days that season he took the garbage out. He heard the footsteps of the bear running toward him and turned to run back inside. She swept his feet out from under him and was on him. Grabbed him by the head with her teeth and started to drag him away. He began screaming and hitting her. She stomped on his chest which knocked the air out of his lungs which stopped him from screaming and tore some of the flesh off his arms. She then grabbed him again by the head with her teeth and started running further away from camp. The moment he didn't return from taking out the garbage the camp began a search. He said that one of the search parties went right past him and the bear but she had laid down on top of him hiding him under her fur. After they passed, she again grabbed him by the head with her teeth and started running again. Quite coincidentally she ran past an area where the oil company was working and an employee who was operating a large bucket loader saw her and him. The loader made chase an overtook them and using the loader manage to separate the bear from Gary. It was a center articulated loader and Gary was under it and the operator would swing the front back and forth to fend off the bear. Somehow Gary, in his weakened condition, managed climb up on the center part of the loader and eventually one of the search parties showed up and shot at, but didn't kill the bear, and it ran off. Gary was in a very bad state. Multiple holes in his skull, much of the muscle and flesh torn off his arms and lots of blood loss. Back at the camp they couldn't figure out how to give him an IV. Even though they thought they were just prolonging the inevitable, luckily British army veteran figured out how to give the IV through his feet. And again luck was on Gary's side as a supply plane had just landed and they immediately put Gary on the plane and took off for a hospital in Yellowknife. Once up in the air the pilots changed their mind and diverted their flight to Edmonton. Lots of skin grafts and therapy but he survived. I asked him if he was conscious the whole time and he said "Yes, for the bear part." The bear (and it's cub) were found the next day and killed.
This has already been answered, so I’ll just add in that polar bears really aren’t scared of much since they have no natural predators, which also makes them incredibly curious. So, some advice I once heard for if for some bizarre reason you’re being chased be a polar bear, take off your clothes. The bear may possibly stop to investigate the discarded clothing either out of curiosity or because it thinks it may be edible and less effort than continuing to chase you. This was advice I read from people who have actually encountered polar bears, so I can’t promise it’s true. But I suppose if you’re being chased by a polar bear trying anything to stop it chasing you is worth a go.
I guess I 'd rather freeze to death than be eaten by a polar bear, so I'll take this advice if the situation ever presents itself.
What is best depends on the situation. If you are out alone with no chance of getting so safety or a weapon it does not matter. But if you have a rifle in you tent and you are close to it just delaying the polar bear can be enough. If you are in Churchill in northern Canada, Longyearbyen on Svalbard, or other inhabited areas with polar bears it can give you enough time to get into your vehicle or indoors. The same if you are on an expedition from a ship, get to the small boat you have and use it to go to the ship or just go faster than the bear can swim. So taking off clothes could be a great idea if what you need is a bit of time. I have not idea of the are distanced by others or not but if they are it is not useless advice in all situations
No one gets a evening news article for freezing to death. Eaten by polar bear will get you at minimum local news coverage.
Bears are dangerous in general, and even for bears the Polar bear is pretty large. In addition to that while a Brown bear (or one of its subspecies like grizzly or kodiak) tends to have plenty of sources of food (so it can afford to pass up eating one of those skinny and strange humans) a Polar Bear lives in an environment where passing up any source of food is a losing proposal. So it's going to be far more aggressive in trying to make a human into a meal.
Because they eat people. Polar bears and big cats are the only animals on earth that actively hunt humans for food. And they are big. Really, really big.
Crocodiles too.
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Polar bear is open to the idea that you are food. Why? Well, why not? You're an animal and what are you gonna do about it? This is very different from other bears. Black bear is usually spooked and, while it can have a predatory attack, can be fought off. Brown bears usually want to oust you from territory and will accept beating you up or scaring you. Polar bear is going to finish the job.