🐾 Walrus

Walrus

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Who it is

• Scientific name: Odobenus rosmarus
• Family & relatives: It is a large flippered mammal, related to seals and sea lions in the pinniped group.
• How to spot it: Easy to spot by its long white tusks, bristly whiskers, and thick wrinkled skin.

Its body & abilities

• Size: Males can reach about 3.5 meters long, with females somewhat smaller.
• Weight: Large males can weigh over 1,500 kilograms.
• Body & adaptations: Both sexes grow tusks, which are long canine teeth, and a thick blubber layer keeps them warm.
• Top speed: It is slow and clumsy on land but a strong, steady swimmer in water.
• Strength: It uses its tusks to haul its huge body onto ice and to break breathing holes.
• Senses: Its sensitive whiskers feel along the seafloor to find shellfish in the dark, murky mud.
• Growing up: A calf stays close to its mother and nurses for a long time, often two years or more.

Where it lives

• Habitat: It lives in cold Arctic seas, resting on sea ice and rocky coastlines.
• Where in the world: Found around the Arctic Ocean near Alaska, Canada, Greenland, and Russia.
• Territory: It follows the moving sea ice with the seasons rather than holding one home range.

What it eats

• Diet: It is a carnivore that mainly eats clams and other shellfish from the seafloor.
• Favorite foods: It also eats snails, worms, and sea cucumbers, and can slurp clams right out of their shells.
• How it hunts: It roots along the bottom with its snout and whiskers, then sucks up soft shellfish.

How it behaves

• How it moves: It swims with its back flippers and can turn its rear flippers forward to walk on land.
• When it is active: It dives to feed and spends long stretches resting in big groups on ice or shore.
• Family life: It is very social and gathers in noisy herds of hundreds or even thousands.
• How it talks: It grunts, bellows, and even makes bell-like sounds, especially the males during breeding.
• Babies: Females usually give birth to a single calf every two to three years.

Its place in nature

• Role in nature: By digging the seabed for food it stirs up nutrients and shapes the ocean-floor community.
• Conservation: It is listed as Vulnerable, with melting sea ice being a major long-term threat.
• Dangers: Its main natural predators are polar bears and orcas, mostly of young or weak animals.

Life & legacy

• How long it lives: It can live around 40 years in the wild.
• In our culture: It has long been vital to Arctic Indigenous peoples for food, ivory, and tools.
• Where to see it: People see them in the Arctic near Alaska, in aquariums, and on wildlife tours in Norway's Svalbard.
• Fun fact: A walrus can turn its skin pinkish when warm, as blood rushes to the surface to cool off.