# Polar bears eat seals but not penguins. Why?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [March 4, 2001, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689 "2001-03-04T03:46:19Z")
**Posts on this page:** 14
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@berdollos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/berdollos)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/1 "2001-03-04T03:46:19Z")
Why do polar bears hunt and eat seals but not penguins?
There is an answer, but you might have to scratch your heard first.
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### Author:  [@Geobabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geobabe)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/2 "2001-03-04T03:48:45Z")
Oh for God’s sake.
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### Author:  [@Turbo\_Dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turbo_Dog)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/3 "2001-03-04T03:49:35Z")
Location, location, location 🙂
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### Author:  [@berdollos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/berdollos)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/4 "2001-03-04T03:50:24Z")
And quickly too!
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### Author:  [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/5 "2001-03-04T03:53:07Z")
Oh. I love it when someone has a fourth-grade puzzle book.
Polar bears certainly ate the original penguins. “Penguin” comes from the Welsh words for “White Head”, and was the name given to the Great Auk, a flightless bird of Artic regions. The name was quite naturally applied to the non-related flightless seafowl of the Antartic regions once the area was opened to scientific discovery. _Ursus maritimus_ (forgive me, but I am writing from memory and may have the binomial wrong) is exclusively a holartic species and never occurs in the Antartic.
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### Author:  [@Demo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Demo)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/6 "2001-03-04T04:36:47Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by DrFidelius \*
> \*\*Oh. I love it when someone has a fourth-grade puzzle book.
> \*\*
Oh. I love it when people get up on their high-horses. :rolleyes:
And **Geobabe** , thanks for contibuting to the OP. If you really felt it lacked that much merit, why didn’t you just leave it alone and let it sink or ask a mod to move it?
A friendly message from your neighborhood newbie-watch: Remember kids, being intelligent and fighting ignorance doesn’t mean you have to cop an attitude.
That being said, this isn’t really the place for trivia questions, **berdollos**. Try MPSIMS.
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### Author:  [@oldscratch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldscratch)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/7 "2001-03-04T04:41:26Z")
Hey Demo,
Shut your pie-hole
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### Author:  [@Geobabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geobabe)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/8 "2001-03-04T04:54:29Z")
Again I say, Oh for God’s sake. Forgive me if I’ve trampled on anyone’s delicate sensibilities, it’s just that I _couldn’t restrain myself_. The OP clearly already knew the answer to the question.
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### Author:  [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/9 "2001-03-04T05:28:54Z")
Okay - here’s what I WANTED to post:
"Mr. Chairman, Mr. Chairman - Point of Order!
Let’s stop dancing around it, shall we? Are the Polar Bears now or have they ever been members of the Communist Party? The witness will please answer the question or be held in contempt of Congress."
Okay Berdy, now both you and I have had our best shots to be smart alecks. Obviously, anyone smart enough to hook up a computer knows that polar bears are antipodal to penguins. So give with the answer before the Mods get Moddish (remember - this is GQ - “General Questions,” not GTQ - “General Trick Questions”)
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### Author:  [@TheLoadedDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheLoadedDog)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/10 "2001-03-04T06:05:34Z")
oh PUh-LEEZE!! How could a penguin kill a seal? 😃
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### Author:  [@Louie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Louie)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/11 "2001-03-04T06:39:58Z")
Because the penguins are stuck in cages whlie the polar bears and seals are outside in their areas in the zoo. The bears like to sneak out and get to the seals in the night.
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### Author:  [@sewalk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sewalk)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/12 "2001-03-04T14:22:42Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by TheLoadedDog \*
> \*\*oh PUh-LEEZE!! How could a penguin kill a seal? 😃
>
> \*\*
Thanks, Dog. I think you’ve given the answer the OP deserved. 😉
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/13 "2001-03-04T14:25:26Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Democritus \*
> \*\*
A friendly message from your neighborhood newbie-watch: Remember kids, being intelligent and fighting ignorance doesn’t mean you have to cop an attitude.
\*\*
[/QUOTE]
**berdollos’** registration date indicates he was around when **manhattan’s** “Moderator’s Notes” thread was still active, and he should be well aware that this kind of screwing around is not appreciated in GQ.
**berdollos** , it is VERY BAD FORM to ask a question in GQ to which you already know the answer, especially a stupid and obvious one.
**Geobabe** , I share your irritation, but it would have been better if you had expanded on your answer just a trifle in your intial response.
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### Author:  [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2001, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/polar-bears-eat-seals-but-not-penguins-why/56689/14 "2001-03-04T17:48:20Z")
**berdollos** , is this website _really_ so lacking in interesting content that you have to post children’s riddles here?
This thread is closed.