Image via WikipediaBy Samuel P. McmillianThere are three primary types of pinnipeds, the seal, the walrus and the seal lion. Pinnipeds are also familiar as the fin-footed mammals. The second family of the pinnipeds consists of just one species, the walrus.
This huge animal, the only known living marine carnivore that has tusks, lives in Arctic waters off both coasts of northern North America and also off northeastern Siberia. It measures from 8 to 12 feet in length when fully grown and weighs up to 3,000 pounds. Its thick hide is tough and wrinkled and almost naked of fur. Both the male and female walrus grow tusks, which they use in fighting and in digging for mollusks. Tusks of an adult walrus may measure as much as 39 inches in length.
Living their lives together in herds, walruses stay in far northern waters during the summer. In the fall they drift southward with the ice while in the spring they swim northward again. Females mate every other year and they usually give birth to a single young, about a year after mating has taken place. The bulls do not form harems as fur seals do, but they will fight fiercely for mates where tusks will clash.
Eskimo prize walruses for their leathery hides, blubber, flesh, and ivory tusks. Many animals are lost during hunts, for walruses often sink after being shot. In recent years walrus populations have steadily decreased. Unfortunately they are in grave danger of eventually vanishing entirely unless the hunting of them is more closely controlled.
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