Polar bear P.O.V.: Collar cam captures unique eye-view
Digital Reporter
Saturday, June 7, 2014, 10:05 AM - That video up above is worth sitting through, and we'd encourage you to do just that.
It's the first polar bear point-of-view footage ever captured, released Friday by the United States Geological Survey. The agency strapped four camera collars onto four female polar bears roaming the frozen Arctic Ocean north of Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, back in April.
"We deployed two video cameras in 2013, but did not get any footage because the batteries weren't able to handle the Arctic temperatures,” said Dr. Todd Atwood of the USGS Polar Bear Research Program said on the USGS website. “We used different cameras this year, and we are thrilled to see that the new cameras worked."
And boy, did they work (although only for a few days). The footage up above is a snapshot in the life of one of the four bears, and we can watch her hunt, swim in the frigid ocean and court a potential mate.
It's not just for entertainment. The footage is invaluable for scientists wanting to observe polar bear habits as the global warming hits the animals' usually frozen habitat, including their movements, and nutrition.
RELATED VIDEO: No fancy collar cam was needed to grab these shots of a wolf cub. See them below.
