Meanwhile in Russia: Feeding Polar Bears

I came across this beautiful rare photos on the internet. These photos are taken during a routine military expedition in Chukchi Peninsula, Soviet Union. Chukchi Peninsula may possibly have more polar bears than people since the climate is very severe and weather can be so fierce in winter that the temperature falls -40 C degrees so that poor white bears and their cubs start freezing and starving.

The soldiers who are serving on the Army District of Chukchi Peninsula, didn’t turn their backs on the poor bears and started to feed them occassionally. Of course they didn't have such big amounts of meat at home to feed several white bears. And soldiers decided to feed the bears with what they had in abundance – tins, or to be more exact, condensed milk.

Soldiers would open such a tin with a tin-opener and then give the can to the bear who licked all the milk from tin and then feed her little bears with it. Those blue and white tins of condensed milk were the winter dessert staple of every Soviet kid.

The condensed milk (called in Russian: sgushchennoye moloko) had indeterminately long shelf life and there was always plenty of it. It was a common dessert in the army too. It isn’t surprised to see it given away to bears, because unlike some stuff that was rationed, the condensed milk in USSR was available in unlimited amounts.