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60 free Walrus trivia questions with answers — nature quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This walrus trivia quiz covers the biology of the Arctic's biggest tusked mammal: what Odobenus ('tooth-walker') means, why the word walrus is 'whale-horse' inside out, how heavy Pacific bulls get, what the tusks are really for, how the whiskers find clams and the piston tongue sucks them out, the throat air sac it sleeps in, the 15-16 month pregnancy, and the two animals brave enough to hunt it. It also covers walruses and people: Inuit and Chukchi hunting and myth, the Lewis Chessmen carved from walrus ivory, the 19th-century slaughter and the recovery on Svalbard, the wandering celebrities Wally, Freya, Stena and Thor, and the walrus in Lewis Carroll, Kipling and the Beatles. Every question was verified against a primary reference (mainly the Wikipedia article on the walrus) and carries a citation. Play it with our polar bear, Arctic and ocean animal quizzes.
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Q 01What is the walrus's scientific name?
Odobenus rosmarus
It is the only living member of the family Odobenidae, which once had at least twenty species.
Q 02What are the two recognised walrus subspecies?
Atlantic and Pacific
A Laptev Sea population was once proposed as a third but has proved to be of Pacific origin.
Q 03The genus name Odobenus comes from Greek words meaning what?
Tooth-walker
It refers to walruses using their tusks to haul themselves out of the water.
Q 04The word 'walrus' comes from Old Norse elements meaning what?
Whale-horse
Old Norse hrosshvalr, 'horse-whale', appears to have been passed to Dutch and north German in inverted form as walros.
Q 05What was the archaic English word for the walrus, still used in French?
Morse
It came via Slavic from Finno-Ugric; the coincidental resemblance to Latin morsus, 'a bite', helped the walrus's monster reputation.
Q 06Which two pinnipeds are the only ones larger than the walrus?
The two elephant seals
Big Pacific bulls exceed 2,000 kg; the Atlantic subspecies runs 10-20% lighter.
Q 07Genetic evidence suggests all pinnipeds descend from an ancestor closest to which modern animals?
Bears
The walrus lineage split from the eared seals 15-20 million years ago.
Q 08How long can a walrus tusk grow?
1 metre
Tusks are elongated canines, present in both sexes, weighing up to 5.4 kg; the biggest males with the biggest tusks dominate.
Q 09What do abrasion patterns show walruses actually use to dig prey from the seabed?
The upper edge of the snout
The tusks are dragged through the sediment; they are for fighting, display, and hauling out onto ice.
Q 10Roughly how many whiskers does a walrus have?
400 to 700
They sit in 13-15 rows, can reach 30 cm and are sensitive enough to distinguish shapes 3 mm thick.
Q 11How thick can the skin be around the neck and shoulders of a male walrus?
Up to 10 cm
Beneath it lies up to 15 cm of blubber; old males' skin turns nearly pink.
Q 12Why can a swimming walrus appear almost white?
Its skin blood vessels constrict in cold water
On land, young are deep brown and adults cinnamon; the pinkish flush returns as blood flows back to the skin.
Q 13What lets a walrus sleep while floating vertically in the water?
An air sac under its throat
Q 21What is the walrus's preferred food?
Clams and other bivalves
It eats more than 60 genera of sea-floor animals, and 97% of the Pacific walrus's diet is benthic invertebrates.
Q 22How does a walrus get the meat out of a clam?
Seals its lips on it and sucks with its tongue
Its vaulted palate allows suction as low as -118.8 kPa underwater; captives at Hagenbeck sucked a 2.3 kg plug out of their pool.
Q 23Walruses at Tierpark Hagenbeck demonstrated their suction by doing what?
Sucking a 2.3 kg metal plug out of their pool
It works like a flotation bubble.
Q 14The male walrus's baculum, or penis bone, is the largest of any land mammal at up to what length?
63 cm
It is the largest both in absolute terms and relative to body size.
Q 15What are the 'bosses' that male walruses develop?
Nodules on the neck and shoulders
They are a secondary sexual characteristic that appears with maturity.
Q 16How long is a walrus's gestation?
15 to 16 months
That includes three to four months of delayed implantation; calves are born April to June and can swim from birth.
Q 17Walruses have the lowest reproductive rate of any pinniped. How often, at most, does a female give birth?
Every two years
Ovulation is suppressed until the calf is weaned after more than a year of nursing.
Q 18Walruses are the only pinnipeds known to do what?
Suckle their young at sea
Calves may stay with their mothers for up to five years, and adult males have been seen caring for orphans.
Q 19What was the name of the oldest known walrus, who died at SeaWorld Orlando aged 49?
Slowpoke
Wild walruses usually live 20 to 30 years.
Q 20Through which narrow passage do several hundred thousand Pacific walruses migrate each spring and summer?
The Bering Strait
They move from the Bering Sea into the Chukchi Sea and gather in beach aggregations of tens of thousands.
The plug sat at a depth of 1.1 metres.
Q 24What is the deepest dive recorded for a walrus, in Smith Sound?
Over 500 metres
They usually stay shallow over the continental shelf; near Svalbard the deepest dives averaged just 31 m.
Q 25Which two animals are the walrus's only natural predators?
The orca and the polar bear
Neither relies on walrus, and both mostly target calves; a cornered walrus can fatally gore a polar bear.
Q 26How do polar bears typically hunt walruses?
Rushing beached herds and taking the crushed or wounded
Direct attacks are rare; a walrus that draws a bear into the water may kill it with its tusks.
Q 27Walruses have been observed preying on seals as large as which 200 kg species?
Bearded seal
They also occasionally take Brünnich's guillemots and may scavenge whale carcasses.
Q 28As of 2018, the global walrus population was estimated at how many mature individuals?
112,500
Pacific numbers were above 220,000 in the aerial surveys of 1975-85 and about 129,000 in 2006.
Q 29By 2018, Svalbard's once nearly wiped-out walrus population had recovered to roughly how many?
5,503
Norway banned commercial hunting in 1952 when they were almost gone.
Q 30Walruses once bred on which isolated sandbar 160 km southeast of Nova Scotia?
Sable Island
Colonies of 7,000-8,000 lived in the Gulf of St Lawrence into the 18th century before commercial harvest destroyed them.