Ana María Rodríguez - Polar Bears, Penguins, and Other Mysterious Animals of the Extreme Cold

EXPLORE THE EXTREME ANIMALS OF THE EXTREME COLD!

The Arctic and Antarctica are two of the most extreme environments in the world. They are freezing cold, windblown, lip-cracking dry, and pitch-black for half of the year. But despite these extreme conditions, many magnificent animals call these icy worlds home. Scientists have been amazed and curious about how animals survive in such extremely cold places with limited food. To find out, they have been traveling to the icy worlds to study these extreme animals. Their hard work has revealed incredible findings!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

ANA MARA RODRGUEZ was a scientist doing research in immunology and other biological sciences for over twenty years. She is currently a full-time writer with twenty books published.

Cold, terrible cold:
At -50C a flashlight dies in his hand;
at -55C kerosene freezes;
at -60C rubber turns brittle and snaps

The Arctic and Antarctica are two of the most extreme environments in the world. The Arctic is located at the northernmost region of the world, while Antarctica is on the southernmost region of Earth. The North Pole is located in the Arctic Ocean and the South Pole is in Antarctica.

They are freezing cold, frostbite windy, lip-cracking dry, and pitch-black for half of the year. Despite these extreme conditions, many magnificent animals call these icy worlds home.

Polar bears, penguins, whales, seals, arctic foxes, rabbits, a myriad of insects, birds, fish, plants, and microbes are some of the creatures that live in the icy worlds. Most people, however, would have a hard time surviving there. How do animals do it?

Scientists have been amazed and curious about how animals survive in such extremely cold places with limited food. To find out, they have been traveling to the icy worlds to study these extreme animals. Their hard work has revealed amazing animal adaptations.

Many types of animals live in the icy worlds. However, not many live there permanently. Some animals migrate to warmer lands during the winter and return during summer. They avoid the most extreme conditions they are not adapted to survive in. Many migratory birds, such as geese, and mammals, such as caribou, use this strategy.

Other animals hibernate in an underground shelter to avoid the freezing weather and the lack of food. Hibernating is a deep sleeplike state during which the animals body functions slow down. The body temperature drops, and the animal does not need to eat or even defecate. It is warmer inside the underground shelter than it is outside. This helps animals not to freeze. The ground squirrel hibernates in the Arctic.

The arctic fox, like the polar bear, spends its life in the Arctic. Its white fur helps it blend into its surroundings.

The Antarctic cod does not freeze thanks to antifreeze proteins in its blood.

The most extreme animals of the Arctic and Antarctica live there permanently and stay active. The masters of the icy worlds are the polar bear, a mammal of the Arctic, and the emperor penguin, a bird of Antarctica.

The polar bear and the emperor penguin are successful because they stay warm, find enough food, and have babies under conditions many other animals find deadly. One key reason for their success is that both are endotherms, or warm-blooded.

Reindeer migrate south of the Arctic in the winter and return in the spring.

Like all other mammals and birds, polar bears and emperor penguins maintain their body temperature with the heat produced by their body or metabolism. Their body temperature remains the same regardless of how cold it gets. This is the opposite of ectotherms, or cold-blooded animals, whose body temperature is determined by the environment. Reptiles, insects, amphibians, and fish are ectotherms. When it gets extremely cold, ectotherms cannot keep their bodies warm enough to move around to find food. They must leave for a warmer place, enter hibernation, or have another adaptation to survive.

Read on and discover where polar bears and emperor penguins come from. How did they end up living in extremely cold environments? And how did they become the masters of the icy worlds?

More than 200,000 years ago, there were no polar bears on Earth. Polar bears are related to brown bears that ventured into the Arctic during the ice age called the Pleistocene. To survive in this extreme environment, the ancestors of the polar bear changed some of their physical characteristics and habits over a long period of time.

The Pleistocene age occurred between 2 million and ten thousand years ago.

Thousands of years ago brown bears living on the Arctic mainland, from Siberia to Nunavut in Canada, explored northern territories looking for food. During winter, the bears could move back to warmer southern lands.

The polar bears ancestor probably looked a lot like this grizzly bear. Grizzly bears are a subspecies of the brown bear.