A cub appears to wave at Goldstein

UK-based Goldstein, who is a guide for Exodus, says: ‘Polar bears are in danger of becoming an anachronism, a fading apex predator that suffers more and more as the sea ice melts earlier each year.’

Taking the plunge

Standing proud on the ice

Cubs make their way across the bones of a whale carcass

Playing musical ice floes

A mother and her cubs

Balancing on a cliffside, hoping for a dinner of guillemots and kittiwake birds

Adrift on a tiny chunk of ice

A display of synchronised swimming

A bear stands in the middle of an ice floe

A brave close-up

Dipping a toe in

Leaping on to a tiny piece of ice

Shaking it all off. All photographs: Paul Goldstein/Exodus/Rex Features