The giant pinnipeds that lounge about on the ice floes of Canada's Arctic seem as timeless as the ancient landscape that surrounds them. Since time immemorial, the Atlantic walrus (Odobenus rosmarus rosmarus) has inhabited the ever-shifting ice limits of the North, providing the Inuit people with an indispensable resource for food, tools, and clothing.
At an average weight of 1,350kg (2,976 lbs), an adult male was a significant treasure indeed! It is believed that Walruses mate in the spring and that the females have a gestation period of 15 months. The female births one calf every two years. The walrus gives birth on sea ice, producing single calf weighing about 68 kilograms. The calf is 50 inches (125 cm) long at birth. At two weeks of age it can swim, at 6 months it can eat solid food, and at two years it leaves its mother and joins a herd of young walruses.
Once plentiful as far south as the St. Laurence Gulf, the Atlantic walrus fell prey to the whaling industry of the 19th century. Today, its range within Canada is limited to the eastern Arctic and Hudson Bay with occasional sightings along the Labrador coast. The current estimate of 15,000 walruses (in Canada and western Greenland) is a fraction of the robust populations that graced these regions just few generations ago.