Polar Bears Running Out of Food

a study bear wearing a video collar

US Person suggested several years ago to the NRDC that they could become the "poster child" of global warming because they are so dependent on sea ice for hunting seals.  Sea ice in the Arctic is rapidly disappearing at a rate surprising even to experts.  The ice coverage in the Arctic is reduced 14% per decade.  As the ice floes disappear, surviving polar bears are moving inland, and swimming farther. The cost will be of extreme proportions: a third or more of them will die from starvation or drowning.  Recently a grotesquely tragic video of a starving polar bear circulated on the Internet.  It will not be re-posted here because it is so distressing to watch.  Her emaciated body revealed her fate: her muscles will atrophy eventually making her immobile, to die a painful and prolonged death.

Authors of a study published recently in the journal Science collared nine female to track their hunting efforts over 8-12 days in the Beaufort Sea during 2014-2016.  Blood and urine samples show the bears have a high metabolic rate, requiring a lot of food.  In the spring bears catch mostly juvenile seals, but as the year progresses the prey is more experienced and becomes more difficult to catch.  USGS estimates the additional hunting activity requires 1-4 extra seals a year. Single adults may be able to survive this additional burden, but for mothers nurturing one and two year old cubs, the energy deficit cannot be overcome.

In other polar bear news, a German cruise worker shot and killed a bear on Spitsbergen Island in Norway's Svalbard Archipelago on Sunday. [photo] The cruise company said the bear was shot in "self defense" of another guard employee who was slightly injured by the animal during a landing, and that it "greatly regrets this incident"  Polar bears have been protected in Norway since 1973 and nearly 1,000 were counted on Svalbard during a 2015 census. Five fatal attacks have been recorded in the last forty years.