Frozen Dinners Trivia Quiz

Answer: Arctic hare

The Arctic hare is highly adapted to living in the Arctic tundra in northern Canada and coastal Greenland. For a hare it has shortened ears and limbs, but it is still one of the largest of the hare and rabbit species. It can be up to 28 inches long and weigh 15 pounds. It can run at 40 miles per hour. It lives underground (unusual for a hare). They are usually found alone but can be seen in groups during winter where they will huddle together for warmth.

Arctic hares are folivores preferring willow twigs and leaves. They will eat lichen and other plants if willow is scare. Conversely, they are hunted by Arctic foxes, red foxes, wolves, mountain lions, lynxes and even ermine. Snowy owl and gyrfalcons are their aerial predators.

Civet de lievre is a French stew made with onions and chives. Hare, rather than rabbit, is used including the blood from the animal.

This question cooked up by 1nn1 who is quite partial to rabbit cooked in the French manner but cannot recall eating hare.

Answer: Jellyfish

The protein in the gonads of jellyfish or squid is thought to provide a good source of carbon and protein for Adélie penguins. They live in colonies on the Antarctic continent, side-by-side with their Emperor penguin cousins. These penguins will eat different foods depending on the season, and whether or not they are gathering food to feed to their young. Krill makes up about forty percent of the bird's diet.

This question was fished out of the sea by Phoenix Rising member VegemiteKid.

Answer: Keratin

Also called bristles and whalebone hair, baleen is actually made from the protein keratin and acts as a filter-feeding system inside the whale's mouth. Some baleen whales also have grooves in their throats that can balloon out allowing the whale to take in a larger volume of water. The water is then pushed through the baleen, trapping krill, zooplankton, and small fish which the whale then swallows.

There are several species of baleen whales, including the blue whale, minke, humpback, and grey whales.

This question was sifted out by Leith90.

Answer: Leopard seal

The leopard seal is the most dangerous predator faced by all penguin species. Leopard seals can attack on both land (ice) and sea but are most formidable in the ocean where their agility and speed give them a great advantage. The leopard seal is the second largest species of seal in the Antarctic region. All species of penguins are eaten by them. All of the others can and will eat penguins but do not hunt them like leopard seals do.

This question has the seal of approval from its author Phoenix Rising member tazman6619.

Answer: Bearded seals

The Polar bear is seen as an apex predator of the Arctic region and its main food is seal. It loves seal, particularly bearded and ringed seals. One of the reasons for this is that it needs around two kilograms of fat per day to provide it with its energy needs and one of these seals, average weight 50-55 kilograms, would be sufficient to provide it with a week's worth of energy. It is also a scavenger and will not refrain from chewing on the carcass of a beluga whale or narwhal. If food is scarce it will turn its attention toward anything that is available, which could mean reindeer, rodents, eggs, or vegetation. It would even resort to eating human rubbish.

The Adélie penguin lives in a completely different hemisphere to the bear, hence it is not a part of its diet.

This question was scavenged by Phoenix Rising's own dancing bear, pollucci19.

Answer: They rob and eat the prey of other birds

Even found at the Geographic South Pole the south polar skua is recognised by its large size, distinct barrel chest and white wing flashes. It is similar to the great skua, found in the North Atlantic. The south polar skua grows to 53cm but will challenge much larger birds when seeking to steal their prey. They adopt an aggressive stance and display brute force when harassing other birds, and adults usually only fall prey to raptors and, occasionally, the orca.

This question was enthusiastically scavenged by Phoenix Rising member VegemiteKid.

Answer: Will attack humans

The Greenland shark is also called the gurry shark, grey shark, or by its Inuit name Eqalussuaq. Greenland sharks have the longest known lifespan of all vertebrate species, which is somewhere between 300-500 years. The species is also one of the largest species of shark.

The Greenland shark has the lowest swim speed across all fish species, which accounts for its very slow metabolism and extreme longevity. It swims at about 1.2 km/h (0.75 mph), and has a top speed of 2.6 km/h (1.6 mph). Seals, their major food source, swim twice as fast making it unclear how the sharks are able to prey on seals. One theory is that they may ambush seals while they sleep.

This creature has a high concentration of trimethylamine N-oxide (TMAO), a nitrogenous waste product analogous to urea in mammals, in its tissues. This causes its flesh to be toxic and can be dangerous if eaten as meat.

You can make the flesh edible and safe by boiling it several times in water, drying, or fermenting it for several months to produce kćstur hakarl, an Icelandic national dish. This is achieved by burying the meat in the ground for 6-8 weeks, which forces the TMAO out of the meat and creates a partial fermentation. The "cured" meat is then hung up in strips to dry. This takes another few months.

This question was concocted by team member 1nn1 who would like to visit Iceland as part of his bucket list but will fast for the duration of the visit.

Answer: Two inches long (six centimetres)

Krill are classified as zooplankton which means (a) they're animals - that's the zoo part and (b) they float upon the upper levels of the ocean - that's the plankton bit. They look very much like shrimp, are semi-transparent in nature, and they will weigh about a gram when fully grown. Now that you know their weight, consider this: a Blue whale can eat up to 8,000 pounds (3,600 kilograms) of krill per day. This means that the amount of krill that is out there is staggering. So, why are they so plentiful then? Krill are extremely efficient feeders. They have thousands of very fine hairs called setae which capture microscopic feed so effectively. They feed on phytoplankton - the phyto bit indicates that it is a plant - that is microscopic in size but grows so abundantly, particularly in the Antarctic, because of (a) its depth and (b) the areas ability to capture nutrients.

This question was planked on by Phoenix Rising team member pollucci19.

Answer: False

Arctic wolves are like every other wolf and hunt in packs. The Arctic wolf is a subspecies of the gray wolf. They are smaller in size and whiter in color. Their main habitat is Canada's Queen Elizabeth Islands but they can also be found in Alaska and Greenland. Their main prey is muskoxen and Arctic hares. There is a debate about which is primary but studies have shown that the wolves thrive when more muskox are present whereas the quantity of Arctic hares available does not affect their population. Pack hunting is necessary to bring down large prey like the muskox.

The term lone wolf derives from the fact that wolves are by nature pack animals and are only loners when forced by circumstances like being excluded from the pack or involuntarily separated some other way. By choice they will normally remain as members of the pack.

This question was written by Phoenix Rising's lone wolf tazman6619.

Answer: No, killer whales will attack leopard seals

Habitat distribution is the key to answering this question. Leopard seals are found all around the coast of Antarctica and on nearby ice floes as well. They are not found in the Northern Hemisphere so they are not at risk of being taken by a polar bear. Killer whales (Orcinus orca) are the largest member of the dolphin family AND are found in the oceans worldwide including around Antarctica. They don't mind a leopard seal for dinner. Killer whales are apex predators, are 6-8 metres long and weigh over 6 tonnes. Females are slightly smaller.

This question was dreamt up by 1nn1 who was comforted by the thought he was a long way from the nearest orca when he wrote this question.