Arctic animals for kids: 8 species to research

The Arctic is a frozen ocean ringed by tundra, dark for months in winter, and the animals that live there year-round are built for it. Polar bears hunt seals from the sea ice and are the largest land carnivores; their fur is translucent, not white, and scatters light over black skin. Arctic foxes swap a brown summer coat for a white winter one and stay warm well below −40 °C. Walruses haul out in herds and use their tusks to climb onto ice; narwhals winter under dense pack ice, diving deeper than 1,500 metres; and belugas gather by the thousand in summer estuaries. Snowy owls nest on the open tundra and hunt lemmings by day as well as night, and orcas push north each summer as the ice retreats. Moose live at the Arctic's southern edge in the boreal forest. Because so much here depends on sea ice, the polar bear is listed as Vulnerable and the whole system is changing fast.