Polar Bear Collar Video: First-Person Camera Shows What It's Like To Be Ursus Maritimus

WATCH: What It's Like To Be A Polar Bear

Polar bears are difficult to study in the wild. Not only are they tough to locate in the vast wilderness of the Arctic but when you do find one they tend to try and eat you.

In order to overcome these obstacles, researchers are recruiting a captive bear in Oregon Zoo to help calibrate a high-tech collar to track their behaviour.

It's hoped by doing so scientists can study how the animals are reacting to retreating ice caps and fill in some blanks in their knowledge of global warming.

Tasul chases a ball in sunny Oregon Zoo

Tasul, the white-furred participant, will wear a collar containing an accelerometer and a camera to record everyday behaviours like walking, eating, sleeping and swimming.

A GoPro camera has also been fitted to Tasul giving a pretty cool glimpse into everyday life as a bear in Oregon Zoo. Once calibrated they can be fitted - carefully - to wild animals.

This will then create a "digital footprint" for polar bear behaviour in the Arctic.

Anthony Pagano, a wildlife biologist with the USGS Alaska Science Center, said in a statement: "Our research shows that polar bears are being displaced from sea ice habitats they formerly used.

"This collaborative project with the Oregon Zoo will help us understand the implications between going to land or staying with the ice as it retreats hundreds of kilometres north into the Arctic Basin."

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