{"id":12196,"date":"2012-01-04T10:39:21","date_gmt":"2012-01-04T15:39:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/wildwire\/?p=12196"},"modified":"2025-06-13T13:57:57","modified_gmt":"2025-06-13T17:57:57","slug":"what-colour-is-a-polar-bear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/omg_animals\/what-colour-is-a-polar-bear\/","title":{"rendered":"What Colour is a Polar Bear, White, Yellow or Green?"},"content":{"rendered":"

What colour do you think Polar bear fur<\/a> is? That might seem like a silly question but the answer might surprise you. HINT: it\u2019s not white! Polar bear fur is actually clear! That\u2019s right! CLEAR!<\/p>\n

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\nBut if the Polar bear\u2019s skin is black, how come they don\u2019t look black in colour? Well, each of the longer guard hairs on the Polar bear\u2019s body is hollow and reflects visible light, much like snow. So when the sun is shining brightly, Polar bears<\/a> appear bright white.<\/p>\n

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This polar bear has algae growing in its hair. Photo Credit: Steven Pierson<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Since these hairs are hollow, the Polar bears\u2019 diet and environment can affect their colour. Polar bears whose diet has a lot of seals in it can look light yellow<\/strong><\/span> because of the seal oils. Polar bears that live in warmer climates (like in zoos) can have algae growing in their hair, which can make them look green! <\/strong><\/span>Don\u2019t worry, being green doesn\u2019t cause the Polar bear<\/a> any harm and a bath with special salt solution turns them white again.<\/p>\n

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Looking for more details? Check out this article where we dive deeper into the science behind why Polar bears look white!<\/a><\/h2>\n
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If you think animals are amazing, the<\/span> Earth Rangers Podcast<\/a> is for you!<\/span><\/b><\/h3>\n

Join Earth Ranger Emma as she travels the world on a quest to solve some of nature\u2019s greatest mysteries! With top ten countdowns, animal guessing games and epic animal showdowns, this is a journey you won\u2019t want to miss!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Polar bears fur just might not be the colour you think it is. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12198,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[664,13,409,1353,931],"tags":[424,43,227,305],"class_list":{"0":"post-12196","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mammals","8":"category-omg_animals","9":"category-omg-facts","10":"category-to-edit","11":"category-all","12":"tag-algae","13":"tag-fur","14":"tag-polar-bear","15":"tag-seal"},"pp_force_visibility":null,"pp_subpost_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_force_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_subpost_visibility":null,"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12196"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12196\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":609109,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12196\/revisions\/609109"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}