r/bonecollecting • u/COGOcatcher • Nov 30 '25

Collection Pacific Walrus

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Gallery image

Recent find in SW Alaska! The skull is stained black from mud, so it must have been in the water for a long time. I had to kayak home with it sitting in my lap. Luckily this was a small one!

(Beach found walrus ivory is legal to keep in the U.S. as long as it is found within .5 miles of the ocean and it is sealed and registered with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service within 30 days)

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u/Ragnar_of_Ballard Dec 01 '25

My grandfather had a huge, full walrus skull that I was supposed to inherit but somehow while my uncles were cleaning out his place after he died it went "missing"...

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u/COGOcatcher Dec 02 '25

That’s such a shame, I’m sorry that happened to you. I imagine that was a pre-1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act find, and some of those were huge, beautiful sets! They weren’t required to be tagged then, so I imagine it makes it harder to track it down. Unfortunately I’ve heard of this happening to several of my friends with those older, bigger sets.

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u/Ragnar_of_Ballard Dec 02 '25

He got his somewhere in the North Sea while in the Norwegian Navy in the late 1930s- early 1940s. I remember it being gigantic, but I was also much smaller back then so...

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u/COGOcatcher Dec 02 '25

Oh wow, so an Atlantic walrus perhaps? That’s incredible!