I couldn’t bear losing you! Desperate polar bear scrambles down a crumbling ice cliff to find her missing cub
- A mother bear searches the snowy peaks for her daughter who has fallen behind
- She twice scrambles down an icy ledge to find her after hearing her distant cries
- Spotted by photographer Paul Goldstein on Baffin Island, Canada
A polar bear’s dramatic search for its cub over huge ice caps has been captured in a stunning series of pictures.
The huge bear can be seen awkwardly descending from an icy ridge to search, but after climbing back up without any success, she scrambles down it again after hearing the cub’s cries.
The family drama played out in front of a wildlife photographer on ice caps in Canada.
A mother polar bear was spotted searching around a large icy ledge for her daughter who had fallen behind on the ascent
The pictures were taken on Baffin Island in Canada, a huge and mostly deserted landscape full of beautiful scenery
While on the vast reaches of Baffin Island in the Arctic Circle, the concerned mother misplaced her one-year-old daughter.
Although she could hear the youngster’s cries, she was out of sight at the base of an ice wall.
Photographer Paul Goldstein happened to capture the action as the cub failed to climb up the steep ledge, as the mother stands high up above.
The cub was spotted attempts to climb the large face of the ice ledge but ultimately could not make it to where her mother was waiting
The mother could hear her one-year-old daughter’s cries but could not see where they were coming from
Hearing her cub, the mother decides to unceremoniously scramble down the ice.
Not finding her offspring, she ascended again, only to repeat the clumsy jump off the ledge down to find the cub.
Happy just to have found her daughter safe, the pair are seen wandering off into the snowscape.
‘Finally the gambolling cub located her mother and after a short reunion they investigated the upper reaches of the icy tenement,’ said photographer Paul Goldstein.
Sorry mum! The small cub is quick to cuddle her mother to avoid a telling off after getting lost on the slopes and forcing her to fall down the ice twice in a frantic search
‘My heart was in my mouth when they approached the precipice but they quickly turned round and found a gentler route down before walking off.
‘In the thirty years I have spent following wildlife this was right up there and worth the sunburn, frost nip and general ailments associated with guiding in the deep freeze.’
Paul Goldstein leads special photographic wildlife tours all over the world for Exodus travels.
Baffin Island in Canada is certainly not a place to get lost. The Arctic landscape, named after English explorer William Baffin, is some 507,451 square-kilometres in size, with only 13,000 inhabitants.
The pair, now reunited, wander off happily across the vast Arctic ice
Wildlife photographer Paul Goldstein (pictured with his dog) took the stunning pictures on Baffin Island, Canada in the Arctic Circle