My Polar Bear adventure in Churchill Manitoba started in Calgary. Each fall, there is the world's greatest concentration of polar bears that convene at the edge of Hudson Bay. They wait for the ice to form so they can head northward to start the winter seal hunting season. This is when the tours go out on tundra buggies to see these massive creatures. The tours go for only a couple weekends during the year and really depend on the weather to have bears for viewing. The weekend I went was the very beginning of the season, the ice was just starting to freeze. Some tours stay for a week and live in the Tundra Lodge which is just a motel on wheels. After a full day of viewing the bears, I cannot imagine why I would want to stay there a week but many do. No touching the ground with your feet or anything else allowed for the whole week but living in the heart of polar bear habitat.

Ursa Maritimus or Polar Bears congregate along the coast of Hudson Bay waiting for the pack ice so they can go and hunt seal further north, their main food source. They are really tremendous swimmers. They have hollow hairs which increase their buoyancy. They can swim at about 6.5 miles per hour using their massive feet as paddles. Birth weights average 2 lbs. Imagine these huge animals start off as 2 lb. Cubs remain with their mother for about a year and a half. A bear can eat 100 pounds of fat at one sitting. Big time keto diet.

An incredible thing about polar bears is their ability to delay implantation of a fertilized egg. Mating takes place on the ice during the spring, between April and June, but the embryo will only implant in the fall and only if the mother has stored up enough fat to sustain her and her cub(s) during the denning season. If not enough fat, none of the eggs implant. More than one will implant if sufficient fat stores. The bear will den and emerge in March or April with cubs.