Figure 1. St. Matthew Island is in the Bering Sea off the west coast of Alaska: north of the Pribilofs and south of St. Lawrence Island, at about 60°N latitude. Compare this to the southern end of James Bay, Canada – which has a stable population of polar bears – at about 53 ⁰N and Churchill, Manitoba – the “polar bear capital of the world” – at 58 ⁰46’N. Maps from Wikipedia.