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Some creatures alive today
almost feel

like they belong to
a prehistoric past.

I once had a dream full
of saber-toothed animals --

saber-toothed cats,
saber-toothed deer,

saber-toothed salmon.

And amongst those animals

was a saber-toothed seal,
the walrus.

There's something about walrus.

An animal we all recognize...

yet one that few have ever seen.

This is like a dream come true,
it's unbelievable.

Their lives revolve
around sea ice in ways

we are only just beginning
to understand.

A lot of digging
and not so many clams.

As Arctic temperatures rise,

I wonder how walruses
will cope in an ice-free world

and how baby orphans
like this one...will survive.

You see anything, Randy?

Mm...

It might take a little while
to bump into something.

Looking out across
the last of the spring sea ice,

I feel the fragility
of the Arctic.

I'm a paleontologist
and I oversee the world's

largest natural history
collection...

...a constant reminder
that 99% of all species

that have ever lived
are now extinct.

Now the Arctic is warming
so rapidly,

I'm increasingly worried
about the future

of an animal close
to my heart --

the walrus.

They gonna have
the little babies with them now?

Yeah, they've still got babies
with them.

I'm desperate to see a walrus,

but they can be very hard
to find.

I've seen them before on land
but never on sea ice,

which turns into
a giant jigsaw puzzle

as it breaks up in spring.

Whoa.

Gotta watch out
for those ice cubes.

Although Randy
and his two buddies,

who are Alaskan natives,
don't seem too fazed.

Hear them from miles away.

- Oh, really?
- Yeah.

Does it go --
sound go further than the smell?

Hmm, yeah, you can -- you can
hear them before you smell them.

- I think I see a walrus.
- Females.

Do you smell them now?

Yeah.
Pretty stinky.

I think there's, like, 50
of them up there.

Oh, really?

Yeah, look at that,
there they are.

Alright, now we're talking.

One thing I love about walrus

is that
they're very social animals.

Herds of females,
some with calves,

huddle tightly together
on ice floes.

Is that a pup over there?

Could be a little pup next
to the mom.

What a cute baby.

Pups are born on the ice
in spring.

They rely on their mom's
milk for up to two years.

During this time,
they share an unbreakable bond.

Check out these guys over there,

a bunch of juveniles
hanging out together

with much smaller tusks.

This is like a dream come true,
it's unbelievable.

Sitting out
in the middle of the Bering Sea,

on a floating chunk of ice.

These walrus make all sorts of
cool sounds.

It's sound,
which is kind of like

the "get off my little tiny
piece of ice" sound, I think.

There it is.

It's kind of funny, though,

because they love being
really close together

and pile on top of each other,
but they hate it, too.

They're always pushing
each other

and coming out with each of
their tusks and stuff like that,

like brothers and sisters
fighting in a weird way.

It's like there's all the ice
in the world,

and they're just fighting
over a little piece of ice.

Little baby walruses are very
vulnerable to all this jostling,

so mothers protect them by
spreading out on the ice floes.

These islands of ice
are their sanctuaries.

It's kind of an amazing paradise

as the sea ice becomes
a moveable platform

on which young families
of walruses can move along,

and it's like a whole fleet
of little boats moving north.

So, if I was a walrus,

I could just lie down
on this piece of ice

and enjoy my life

and I'd just be motoring north
where I wanted to go.

Right below me on the bottom of
the seafloor, plenty of clams.

Life is good.

And it's a beautiful day
in the Bering Sea.

Down!

To survive on the sea ice,

the walrus pups stay
very close to their moms.

But occasionally
one turns up alone...

sometimes in the strangest
of places.

Back in June of 2017,

a couple of goldminers

were working right off
the coast of Nome

and they were surprised to find
a little baby walrus hiding

in a box on the deck.

Such a cute little animal, about
the size of a big, fat dog.

And it didn't want
to go anywhere.

Its mom was nowhere to be seen.

They took this great video
of this thing.

Look at that guy,

that is not a happy
little walrus.

He's just looking pretty sad,
he's moving very slow,

he's just kind of rubbing
his muzzle against the barrel

and, like, "What's going on?"

Looking for some walrus milk,
it looks like.

You can tell he's dehydrated.

Cute little guy.

But they did the right thing

and the guys called
the local authorities

and transferred him down

to the SeaLife Center
in Seward, Alaska.

Okay, lift.

Alright, bring that cart closer.

The Alaska SeaLife Center is
the only place in the country

to take in baby walruses.

10 orphans have come through
its doors

since it opened in 1998
and now they have a new one.

Do you want to come on out?

This one-week-old baby was
discovered alone

on a beach in the far north
of Alaska in 2024.

She's covered in scratches
and puncture wounds,

probably from rolling around
on the rocky beach.

Ooh!

- Oh, got that on you.
- Got you too.

Oh, yeah!

She's a snotty-nosed kid.

That's one way to get a sample.

I'm pretty confident this calf
would not have made it.

She was clearly alone
for a period of time.

She was already malnourished.

But the biggest sigh of relief
I had was her being good

about taking food from a bottle.

It makes a world of difference.

It's a critical time
for this baby walrus.

Three of their previous orphans
were so ill that they died.

For me,
the big question is

whether this orphan's
plight might be linked

to changes in its Arctic home.

Most of the world's walrus,
some 250,000 of them,

live in the frigid seas
between Russia and Alaska.

Adults breed during the winter
in areas of open water

on the southern edge
of the sea ice.

As the ice begins to melt
in spring,

females and their calves
drift north on their ice floes,

through the Bering Strait
and into the Arctic Ocean.

The males stay south
and head to land.

One of their favorite spots
is Round Island.

Round Island is
a remote, ethereal place

I've always wanted to return to.

I was last here in 1985.

It's so amazing to be back here

because these walruses stuck
their selves in my mind

like a -- a mind worm
or something like that.

In my early 20s, I was working
as a marine geologist,

investigating
the feeding grounds of walrus.

And it was here on Round Island
where I had my first encounter.

It was love at first sight.

I wake up
to a mysterious chiming...

almost like church bells.

It feels like the walrus are
welcoming me back to the island.

A lot of these walrus

do seem to be having
kind of a social time

with their friends.

When two of them
approach each other,

they go right face-to-face

and their little
fuzzy muzzles come together,

like a kiss, almost, hello.

Those whiskers are very tactile
and very sensitive.

They're actually feeling
each other's face,

and I guess saying, "Hey,
you're a walrus, too.

I'm a walrus."

And who knows
what other information

they're transferring.

Walruses make their chimes
by moving air around sacs

in their neck.

Their air sacs
also serve as life jackets,

allowing them to take naps
while at sea.

So it's funny.

It looks like a bunch
of pinkish-brown corks bobbing

around a bunch of rocks.

They look like they're dead,
but they're just asleep.

And you watch them
for 10 or 15 minutes

and finally they'll put
their head up

and blow a little bit of air
out, take a breath

and go back to sleeping.

This is the oldest
wildlife sanctuary in Alaska.

When hunting was banned here
in 1960,

Round Island
became a safe haven for walrus.

Seabirds flock here
in their tens of thousands

to nest on the cliff faces.

Check out this sweet
little parakeet auklet.

At the south end of the island,

Steller sea lions cavort
in the waves.

Their bellies are full
after feasting on herring.

They are so much more frisky
than their walrus cousins.

They prefer to hang out
on their own beach

on the north side of the island.

It's an amazing spot.

We're on the edge
of Round Island

and looking out at this point

and there's about 300 walruses
hauled out on the beach,

sleeping together.

For the next couple of months,

these walrus will be doing
what they're doing now,

which is not a whole lot.

And that's
what Round Island is --

a place for these males
to chill, or rather warm up,

after a strenuous winter
breeding season.

Their spring break and summer
vacation, all rolled into one.

This one right now
actually is lying on his back

with his tusks
straight up in the air

and his --
and his flippers out.

It's a pretty non-stressful life
for the walrus

around Round Island.

Wake up in the morning,

go for a swim with a couple
of your buddies,

crawl out on a rock, sleep
some more, go back to the beach,

sleep some more.

Life is good.

When I was here last,
almost 40 years ago,

there were a lot more walruses
on the beach.

It makes me wonder
why numbers are down today.

During the spring and summer,

two wardens live on Round Island

and monitor walrus arrivals
and departures.

You guys are here for three and
a half months by yourselves.

- Yeah.
- What's life on the island like?

This is my personal
happy place.

I mean, you get to be
on this remote island

where there's not a lot
of human activity,

quiet, you can just be
with your thoughts

and surrounded by nature.

It's really a sort of
connection with a place

and a natural place that it's
easy to not have in our lives

and that's pretty magical.

So, you count the walruses
every day.

Yes.

So, there's nine beaches
that we count every day,

either us going in person

or using cameras
that we keep on the island

that actually take pictures
of all the haulouts.

Over winter, Round Island
is locked in by sea ice...

...but it quickly opens up to
visitors after the spring thaw.

We usually see the arrival
of walruses here

any time between starting
as early as February or March.

We start seeing our peak numbers
towards the end of July

through potentially September.

And what's a big count for you?

Most years, we'll have
a bunch of days over 1,000,

and a few days
that are 2,000 or 3,000.

Watching walruses move all
at once makes me think of them

more like a single entity.

One day they're here
and the next they're gone.

Walrus come and go from
Round Island every few days,

sometimes to escape heavy surf,
to feast on clams

and sometimes to visit a thermal
spa on the nearby mainland.

The black sand here
absorbs energy from the sun

and heats up as the day
goes on --

just what's needed
after a cold dip.

The tightly packed huddle
keeps them all warm,

but newcomers aren't
always welcome.

The strange lumps
around big males' necks

helps protect them
from tuskings by rival males.

They're called bosses
and are a sign of maturity,

like a lion's mane.

The older the walrus,
the bossier it gets.

Those bosses --
the lady walruses

think that they're --
they're sexy.

I've heard it's good eating.

Really?

- It's like gristle.
- Almost like crackling.

Oh, my goodness,
walrus crackling.

Like pigskin.

One thing our position here
on the island all summer

has allowed us to observe

is the way sounds
can cause disturbance.

When you're sitting
up there counting

and you hear
a commercial jet go over,

you can see sometimes
it will cause a stampede

or a disturbance.

They have really poor eyesight,

so they rely heavily on what
the rest of the herd is doing.

Sounds, airplanes,
gunshots, boats, bears...

- Foxes.
- Foxes?

There's a lot of little things,
even if it's nothing,

a rock falling, it can cause
thousands of walruses to --

Yeah, flee to the water.

And it's the older animals
and the younger ones

that get trampled
and killed or injured.

Baby walrus avoid
being crushed by living

on the sea ice with their moms.

You got it.

This one ended up on a beach
separated from its mother.

There you go.

After a few days' rehab
at the Alaska SeaLife Center,

Little Miss Walrus
as she's being called,

seems to be doing well.

Three, two, one.

They do a sneaky X-ray
while she feeds.

Three, two, one.

Fortunately, there's
no broken bones.

The most challenging part
of this cow's rehabilitation

is just the unknown.

These are very young,
very sensitive animals

and we don't know at any point
could she get sick for a reason.

Great job.
You're doing so great!

Now you get to have fun
if you want to have fun.

Like most babies, Little
Miss Walrus should enjoy a bath.

All she could do at that moment
in time was just put her head in

'cause she was just so tired.

But the fact that we're
able to introduce her to water

and the fact that she took to it
right away...

just seeing her really explore

and really love that water was
really heartwarming.

Oop, thank you.

Baby walrus need
round-the-clock care

and there's no shortage
of volunteers flying in to help.

We're a lot of moms.

She has about 10
or 12 different moms.

It's also just giving her
the kind of social experience.

We're actually sitting with her

and getting her that close
contact that she would need.

We can tell already
she's a fighter

and that's what you need
when you have an animal

that you are rescuing
and rehabilitating

is they've got to put in some
of the effort themselves, too,

and we're giving her everything
that we can

and she's actually responding
to it and that's amazing.

Little Miss Walrus
has become highly dependent

on her surrogate moms.

She can never be released
back into the wild.

She would not survive.

Instead, she will be moved
to a much larger SeaLife center

where hopefully she'll make
friends with other walruses.

Dozer!

Hi, buddy!

Dozer is a sight to behold --

a 3,500-pound adult male
in his prime.

- Alright.
- Wow!

He was born at SeaWorld San
Diego and is now 31 years old.

We just celebrated
his birthday with tons of clams

and a large frozen ice cake.

Do you want to give him a fish?

Yeah, hell yeah.

Alright, there you go,
right up to his mouth.

- Alright, Dozer.
- Super easy.

- It's like straight in.
- Don't take my job, okay?

His breath isn't bad actually.

I thought he'd have
awful breath.

Their breath is not too bad.

It's the other end
that, you know...

Dozer has an impressive
appetite and, like all walrus,

is a virtuoso vocalist.

There we go.

Wow. That whistle is great!

It's amazing, isn't it?

It's only when you're this
close to a fully grown walrus

that you can really appreciate
how big,

weird and wonderful
these animals truly are.

Bulbous eyes, which allow
them to see behind their head,

giant saber-toothed tusks
that can grow 3 feet long,

and that great moustache...

...packed with sensitive
whiskers, the vibrissae.

They're using those whiskers
to really comb the floor,

find where their food is.

They are very helpful tools.

They can move them all
independently.

Just like 700 fingers right
on the front of your face.

So if you ever turn out
the lights in your home...

Yeah.

...and you're just
feeling around,

he's definitely good
at doing that.

Wow, amazing.

How much are you feeding him
a day right now?

Right now about 125 pounds
a day.

That's a pretty healthy meal.

Oh, boy.

Walrus will never go
hungry here.

But in the wild,
it's a different story.

So you guys all
found your seatbelts.

Alright, with that,
we'll be off.

Wow. What a fabulous day
to fly, man.

This is gorgeous.

Warmer summers may
be making it harder

for walrus to find enough food.

I'm heading to a beach
to dig deeper into their diet.

What a beautiful spot this is.

It is so glassy out here.

It really is today.

It's a perfect day
for clamming,

and who better to take me
than Willy,

who sports a moustache that
any walrus would be proud of.

There is a seal
or two down there now.

Well, we're gonna see
a whole bunch of sea otters

in the kelp on the back side
of this island here.

- Alright.
- Coming up on our left there.

Oh, my God. Look at them all.

They're all waving at us.

Low tide has exposed
a seafood platter on the beach,

and there are plenty
of creatures looking

to join the feast.

It looks like he's got
a little eel there.

Cute little guy, isn't he?

The tricky thing
about finding clams

is they burrow deep
to hide from predators.

A lot of digging
and not so many clams.

Grizzly bears love clams, too.

They have the advantage
of an incredible sense of smell.

Fortunately, this one is too
busy clamming to care about me.

The fox is hoping for leftovers,

but the bear's not happy
to share.

Ahh! There we go.

Look at that guy.

This is what the bears are
after -- big, fat, juicy clams.

And when they get them,
what they do is

they actually press down
and crack the shells

and lick the clam meat out
of the shells.

And the bears go for clams
during the low tides

and the walruses are going after
clams that are in water depths

of anywhere from a few
feet to maybe 200 feet deep

and they go after them
in a different way.

People used to think

that walrus used their tusks
to dig for clams

like bears use their claws,

but we now know they use
their tongue like a piston

to squirt a powerful jet
of water

that blasts away the mud
to expose the buried clams.

And they use their
super-sensitive whiskers

to find their tasty treasure.

So, what the walrus does is

it literally puts the clam
in its lips like that

and then sucks

and the walrus sucks at
least the siphon out of the clam

and sometimes
the entire clam body.

Then they'll spit the
empty shell back onto the bottom

of the seafloor
and go for another clam.

And some walruses, like
the ones we saw in Round Island,

can do something
like 5,000 clams a day.

So, if you do
a quick thumbnail calculation,

there's around 250,000 walruses
eating 5,000 clams each,

that's well
over a billion clams a day.

It's hard to believe
there could be so much life

in this desolate ice world.

But sea ice hides
an incredible secret.

Living on the underside
of the ice

are millions of microscopic
organisms, sea ice algae.

They harness energy from the sun
to grow, just like grass.

The animals that graze here
are tiny,

shrimp-like creatures
called amphipods.

Predators then eat
the amphipods,

and the food chain continues.

Ice algae is also essential
to life on the seafloor.

When the ice melts,
the algae sinks to the bottom

and feeds other animals,

including clams
that walrus depend on.

The Arctic is almost like going
to a different planet.

The same with the Antarctic.

When you go to
the polar regions,

you experience things
you just never see

when you're in mid latitudes.

You see sun
that doesn't set in the summer

and doesn't rise in the winter.

And yet there's these areas

of incredibly high
biological productivity,

and the life
that you see in the Arctic,

whether it's walruses
or seals or whales

or seabirds or caribou or moose,

it's just like
a remarkable place.

Arctic terns chase the
midnight sun their whole lives.

They fly all the way from
Antarctica to breed in Alaska,

swapping one summer for another.

The lifecycle of sea ice
is also driven by the sun.

The cool thing about ice in the
Arctic is that it takes a while

to form,
but it can go away very rapidly.

The freeze-up is a gradual thing
and the thaw can be very abrupt.

As the sea ice melts,

it leaves behind
a growing expanse of dark water

that absorbs more energy
from the sun.

The warmer water melts
the remaining ice even faster,

and as Arctic summers become
warmer,

more and more
sea ice is disappearing.

It's been called
the Arctic Death Spiral.

This is kind of personal for me

because when I came up here
in 1982,

there was a lot of sea ice.

And now 42 years later,

we've lost a third of
the summer sea ice.

So just in my own
personal memory of the Arctic,

we've lost about a million
square miles of summer ice.

And you have to imagine

that that's gonna have
some impact on the walrus.

When I was doing
my research back in the '80s,

I was using side-scan sonar to
locate walrus feeding grounds.

These are on the
shallow continental shelf

that bridges Russia and Alaska.

Here, the rich seafloor
contains vast clam beds,

a marine version
of the great plains' grasslands.

Walrus mothers and calves
depend on the moving sea ice

to carry them
over this rich source of food.

But now, as the sea ice melts
farther north,

if they stay on their platforms,

they will be carried
beyond the continental shelf,

into deep water
and deep trouble.

The walrus is not gonna dive
8,000 feet down to eat clams.

It's used to diving
down 200 feet to eat clams,

so once the ice is off the edge
of the continental shelf,

it's not a useful tool
for the walrus.

To survive, they
must abandon their ice floes

and head for land,

and they do so
in extraordinary numbers.

Over 100,000 walrus gather
on a single beach

in the far northeast of Russia.

It's the largest haulout
in the world.

In the past,
far fewer came here.

For many years,
there were none at all.

Today finding an empty spot
on the beach

is a bit of a struggle.

Females and calves
make up over half the haulout.

It's a far cry from their
peaceful life on an ice floe.

The biggest danger to a calf
is being squashed

by another walrus.

Staying close to Mom --

ideally on top of her --
is the safest place to be.

But not everyone survives
the crush.

A new orphan...

another victim
of a disappearing ice world.

Few orphans are as lucky
as Little Miss Walrus.

After a month
at the Alaska SeaLife Center,

things are looking up.

Her skin's looking much better.

Things are starting to heal,
and she has energy.

We now have what was a sick,
weak animal

becoming very animated.

Since she arrived here,

Little Miss Walrus
has put on 60 pounds.

She's ready to make
a bigger splash.

Come here.

There you go.

- Whoa!
- Yay!

She really likes
to do this little throw yourself

into the pool backwards thing.

And the look on her face
was just, like, pure bliss.

This orphan's rehabilitation
is nearing its end.

It's time to move her
to a permanent home.

There's only four facilities
in the United States

that house walruses.

Ultimately, we all
came into a consensus

that SeaWorld Orlando
would be the best place for her

at this time.

A big part of it is

because they have
the most walruses in human care.

Transporting a baby walrus
all the way across a continent

is not an everyday occurrence.

What do you even pack?

Plenty of milk for sure.

Before she leaves Alaska, Little
Miss Walrus is given a new name.

Uki is a shortened version
of ukiaq,

which means autumn
in the language from the land

she came from, which was
the lands of the Iñupiaq people.

And it just so happens
if you shorten that name

a little bit into Uki,
that means survivor.

Alright, let's get
a bottle ready.

Let's get her in the kennel.

Oh! Yum.

It's okay.

Good job!

She's, like, part of the family.

And so it's gonna be definitely
sad, like, coming in to work

tomorrow
and she's not gonna be here

and I'm gonna
have to clean up all her toys.

Bye, I love you!

But it's for the best.

Like, this is the best outcome
for her.

Like, she didn't have
any chance on that beach

and so we are giving
her a second life.

Happy trails, little girl.

- I know.
- Goodbye, sweet girl.

Oh!

For a walrus in the wild,
there's a mounting problem.

As more and more
walrus haul out on land,

they quickly exhaust
nearby clam beds.

And without ice floes
to carry them,

females have to spend more time
swimming to new feeding grounds.

If they lose weight,

it could lead
to lower birth rates,

smaller calves and potentially
even a population crash.

A shortage of food
also affects other animals

that cruise these shores.

When I first came to Alaska in
the 1980s,

it wasn't just walrus
that I was studying,

I was also studying gray whales.

And the reason for that
was that both of these animals

are benthic feeders,

they feed on the sediment
in the seafloor.

Gray whales are the only whales
to feed this way.

They aren't after clams,

but arthropods
and other crustaceans

that live in the seafloor.

They're eating by scooping
up big sections of the seafloor

and they billow
that sand and silt

out of their mouths leaving
behind this great big plume

of muddy water,

and in their mouths
retain the actual prey item.

Gray whales migrate
all the way from Mexico

to feed in the same
rich waters as walrus,

making pitstops along the way
like here off Kodiak Island.

This is a critical habitat area
for gray whales

and before the unusual
mortality events started

and even
the first couple of years,

if we were standing here
at this time of year,

it would be like smoke
stacks going off and just...

Whales everywhere.

...seeing all
of the whales spouting.

After a record-low ice cover
in the winter of 2017,

large numbers of gray whales
began stranding

along their migratory route,

including several
on Kodiak Island.

It's thought that around 5,000
whales died over 4 years,

a population crash of 25%.

It appears that many of them
actually starved to death.

We're able to do
a blubber biopsy basically

just to see
the thickness of the blubber.

It was really,
really tough to cut through

and it was only
about that thick.

Wow!

It should have been
about like that.

These are the animals that
would have been down to Baja

and were headed back up
to the Bering Sea and just...

- Exactly, yeah.
- ...couldn't make it.

Yeah, yeah.

Kind of like the long walk
for food

and they just ran out of food
and...

They just ran out of gas
and they couldn't quite make it.

So insights in the gray whales

will help us understand
what's going on with walrus?

Quite possibly and
all of the change

that's occurring
ultimately have a huge impact

and cause ripples
throughout the entire ocean.

How far these ripples
will spread is uncertain.

But ripple they will.

Less sea ice means
less sea ice algae

and less sea ice algae means an
ecosystem starved of vital food.

The intricate connections
of life put all the animals

that live here at risk,
including our walrus.

The most pessimistic
climate models suggest

that the Arctic could have
a completely ice-free day

as early as 2027.

It's hard to imagine walrus
surviving in an ice-free world.

Unlike seals and sea lions,
who live both in cold

and warm coastal waters,
walrus only live in the Arctic.

But if you go back in time
far enough,

walrus have
a surprising history.

I've come to visit
an old friend.

Tom's another big walrus fan.

- Hey, Kirk.
- How are you, man?

There's one skull
I wanted to show you.

But, uh, I can't...

I can't figure out
where -- where we put it.

Oh, the embarrassment
of riches problem.

Although there's only one
walrus species alive today,

over the past 17 million years,
there's been at least 20.

The earliest had no tusks
and looked more like a sea lion.

Eventually they took
on a more recognizable form.

I think I know where it is.

Oh, that is amazing,
look at that!

It's great.

This is a skull of an
adult Valenictus chulavistensis,

about three and a half million
years old,

from here in the San Diego area.

So what are we looking --
We've got the left tusk.

Right and here's the orbit,
so the eye's there.

- Okay.
- This big hole here is

where the nerves would come out
to feed that moustache.

Oh, all the whiskers, yeah,
okay.

This is amazing because it's --

There -- I can see
some differences,

but it really is a walrus
with big tusks

and clearly a suction feeder.

Yeah, everything about it
suggests

that it's feeding
like a modern walrus.

So, what's the difference?

This animal
that lived here in San Diego

three and a half million
years ago

was not living in any way
with ice,

so this was an animal that
was adapted to warm waters here.

That's pretty cool.

This lineage lived very happily
in a world with no ice at all.

Anything we think
about modern walruses,

we have to put it
in the context of

there was an animal
very like it living in San Diego

three and a half million
years ago,

and that changes the way
I think about a walrus.

Walrus in California?
Who would have thought.

Walrus evolved
as warm-water animals,

long before they made
the Arctic their home.

Perhaps within their DNA, they
retain some sort of resilience

to survive in an ice-free world.

But I really hope it
doesn't come to that.

I've come to check out
Uki's new home.

There are 12 walruses
in aquariums

across the United States

and half of them
live here at SeaWorld Orlando.

These are going to be Uki's
new buddies.

Uki's been kept away
from the other walruses

since she arrived here
four months ago,

and she seems happy as a clam.

Uki! That's a good girl.

Hi.

She's recently out
of quarantine,

which means she's
finally accepting visitors.

Hello.

How's it going? Welcome.

It's very nice to see you.

Come on, Uki.

Come on.

She's like an excitable
little puppy

that wants to follow
me everywhere.

- Come on.
- Let's go, guys.

Let's go.

Yeah, that is so cute.

Come on, Uki.

There we go, up and running.

Ever since Uki was found
alone on that beach,

she's only ever had humans
for company.

So, how's she gonna react

when she meets an adult walrus
in the pool next door?

Kaboodle is
a 21-year-old female.

Her crisscross tusks look
a little menacing.

Come on, Uke.

- Good job.
- Come on.

Come on, Uki.

Let's go round the corner.

Introducing Uki to Kaboodle

has to be a carefully
choreographed operation.

Uki's still
a vulnerable toddler.

Here we go.

- Uki.
- Oh, yeah.

You can go and talk
to Kaboodle.

- No, you like me.
- Take my other bottle.

Give Kaboodle a talk.

Yeah, there we go.

The best way to encourage
walruses to bond --

over food, of course.

She gets bottles
that include fish fillets

- that are ground up...
- Uh-huh.

...and some clams that
are ground up in the blender.

- Clam milkshake, basically.
- Yeah, it's good.

Delicious.

That's gonna be your
new surrogate mom there.

Yeah!

So that's what we're
seeing mostly is lots of kisses

and little, you know...

Almost sound like a kiss.
it sounds like little...

Yeah.
But just even being in here

and listening to
the other walruses

is all part of the transition.

That's what I'm saying.

Kaboodle is
the perfect mom for Uki.

She's been a surrogate
to a rescued orphan before.

The bond between them
will grow stronger by the day,

but right now
Uki just wants to play.

Hup, here she comes.

She clearly.
is having a good time.

Yeah, I think
we have a bond, me and Uki.

That's good.

What a beautiful
little walrus baby.

Oh, my God.
How lovely is that?

Uki will always feel
at ease with people.

Soon she'll be back
with other walrus, too.

A life dependent on human care,

but at least her future
is secure.

As sea ice diminishes more
and more each year,

the fate of walrus in the wild
is increasingly uncertain.

In the future, they will
not just face a shortage of food

and safe places
to raise their pups...

they will face a new threat.

The more the Arctic Ocean
opens up,

the more this once-pristine
wilderness becomes vulnerable.

Walrus evolved
in an ice-free past.

Let's hope they can survive
in an ice-free future.