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A few patches of hair remain on a polar bear skull. Dead bears form lush gardens in the otherwise bare terrain of the tundra, as their bodies provide much-needed nutrients to the plant life.
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While running a photography workshop in Svalbard, one of the targets were polar bears, specifically on the pack ice - their preferred habitat. Normally, there would be sea ice quite close to the Svalbard islands (which is in the high Arctic) even in the ice-minimum months of August and September.
This year, we needed to steam about 100 miles north before we found it, and encountered several bears in the vicinity of 82°34'N - just around 500 miles from the Pole itself.
When the pack ice is not well consolidated, the bears must either swim or, in this case, leap between floes to move about. Quite a sight to see!
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Spitsbergen is the largest island of the Svalbard archipelago, and is full of jagged mountains and glaciers. In fact, even the name 'Spitsbergen' means 'pointed mountains'.