00:00Hi, I'm Susan, a senior keeper at the San Diego Zoo, and today at Polar Bear Plunge is a very special day for our polar bears. It is snow day for them.
00:13The polar bears are showing some great behavior today with the snow. I did see one of our polar bears, Takiq, sliding down the snow down the hill, which I think she thought that was kind of fun. And they also do a lot of digging and making great big holes that they could lay in, as well as they kind of sniffed around and were enjoying the different things that were hidden in the snow.
00:37The polar bears, too, were so excited. They definitely wrestled with each other. Some of that behavior, they grab each other at the neck, and it looks a little bit rough, but they were just really having fun, and it's part of their play behavior.
00:52Polar bear fur appears white because it is actually hollow and it reflects the sun's light, so it altogether appears white, but if they're rolling in different substrate that we give them, substrate is dirt or mulch or even sand, and even when they rub against some palm fronds, they get a little bit green, so they take on the color that they had just rolled around in.
01:22Polar bears do not hibernate. Polar bears do not hibernate. The females will build a den and be in that den for about six months, so it's similar to hibernation, but while they're in that den, they have cubs, and they're feeding their cubs throughout those six months.
01:40Polar bears have some great adaptations, and we saw a little bit on snow day today, although they did slide around on the snow.
01:49As they were walking around, they didn't look like they were slipping at all. They have fur on the bottom of their paws, as well as great foot pads, and so that allows them better traction in the snow.
02:00They also, in the wild, will have great big layers of fat on their bodies to keep them nice and warm in the cold Arctic temperatures.
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