Polar Bear 101 Trivia Quiz

Answer: Teeth

A polar bear has 42 teeth; most of them are sharp and pointy. Like any carnivore, they are used to rip and tear the meat and blubber of a seal.

Answer: Human

Most of the senses of a polar bear are similar to that of modern man.
http://www.seaworld.org/infobooks/PolarBears/pbsenses.html

Answer: Black

It is believed that the hair channels the UV light to the black skin, thereby showing up black when phototgraphed with ultraviolet light.

Answer: Smell a seal

The seal is the main food source for a polar bear. However, in the event of a seal shortage, they will seek out rabbits or Arctic foxes, or go through the landfills or the garbage cans of the local residents.

Answer: A tree-ring test on the teeth

Every year their teeth get a new layer of cementum, although it's a thin layer added to the teeth.

Answer: The nose closes

The nostrils close to prevent water from getting in.

Answer: In a zoo

In the wild they can live to be 20 to 30 years old. One polar bear lived to be 32 years old in the wild. But few make it past 15 to 18 years.

Answer: Inuit

The Inuit live in the northeastern tip of Siberia, across the North American continent (Alaska and Canada) to the eastern coastline of Greenland.

Answer: Brown Bear

In trying to cross breed a polar bear with a brown bear, scientists dicovered the hybrid cub was fertile, thereby leading scientist to believe that polar bears branched from an ancestor of the brown bear.

Answer: Thalarctos maritimus

'Ursus maritimus' is what they are called now but the question was, "what were they formerly called"? 'Ursus arctos' is the brown bear of Eurasia. 'Tremarctos ornatus' is spectacled bear of the Andes Mountains. 'Thalarctos maritimus' is a synonym for 'Ursus maritimus', where 'Ursus maritimus' once refered to the giant polar bear, now extinct.

It was a subspecies of the polar bear that we know today. The giant polar bear's scientific name was 'Ursus maritimus tyrannicus'.