Chipmunks are North American little rodents belonging to the squirrel family. They live in forests where they eat grains, chestnuts, mushrooms, and birds’ eggs. They keep food in their burrows in order to prepare for winter. Chipmunks’ burrows can be as long as 3 meters organised into different rooms with several closed entries.

Walrus are arctic mammals; they usually look quite calm (whenever they’re not in rut period, when they fight each other). They belong to the same family as seals: they feed and reproduce underwater. They are excellent swimmers who can stay underwater for half an hour about dozen meters deep. They mainly eat fish, and mollusks. Their natural predators are orcas, polar bears and men (because of their ivory tusks).

Smaller than common fox, polar fox lives in north hemisphere’s arctic areas. Grey in the summer, white in winter are good camouflages for each season. Its fur helps it keep the warm and its feet are covered with thick hairs. The tail protects the rest of the legs and the muzzle when the fox is sleeping. Cold weather is rarely a problem for polar foxes. Its alimentation varies between bigger animals’ old carcass, in winter, and preys such as birds, fish, rodents, other little mammals, in summer.

In northern Europe (Norway, Sweden, and Finland), the specie is endangered: Only 120 adults are still alive in the 3 countries and the number varies depending on the number of lemmings, one of their preys.

Belugas or white whales usually live in the Arctic Ocean but one can find few of them in the Saint Lawrence River and Saguenay River in Québec. It lives in big communities up to thousands animals. As an adult, its body is entirely white (when youngers’ is grey) and cylindrical when well-fed. It can be as long as 5 to 6 metres and can weigh one to two tons. Its flexible forehead is composed by a membrane in the shape of a bulb the beluga can inflate whenever it wants, giving so the impression that it can have several facial expressions (which is always a success in European aquariums). Beluga’s natural predators are bears and killer whale. When belugas are stuck in ice, bears knock them out and kill them on shore. Unfortunately, man stays the most dangerous predator of belugas. Hunting and pollution threatens the specie.

The dolphin (here Bottlenose dolphin) is a marine-mammal well-known for its cleverness, cheerfulness and compassion for human beings (There are lots of stories about sinking people saved by dolphins) as much as for its complex language based on ultrasound. Studies about dolphins proved that they could recognise themselves in a mirror (Self-conscience) and are able to use tools (and learn how to). It’s interesting to know that dolphins belong to those rare animals pairing for other reasons than reproduction. Dolphins seem to be more or less the highest part of animals’ evolution. High Five