The Arctic is warming so fast that by 2050 it may be largely ice free in summer . Without their frozen hunting platform , how will the polar bears survive ?
A female polar bear nurses cubs on late July ice off Svalbard , Ashere . Fat reserves from hunting ringed and bearded seals , and sometimes walruses , must carry bears through lean summers.
Impervious to a dive-bombing arcitic tern , a hungry bear on the shore of Hustom Bay uses up energy prowing for tern eggs . Summers dry-dock bears around the bay , where biologist Ian Stiring has linked shrinking sea ice to skinnier bears and smaller litters.
Bears at sea , the minimum extent of sea ice in summer has declined by about 30 percent since regular satellite monitoring began in 1979; even in winter the ice doesent fully recover . In some areas females returning to denning sites in autumn face daunting expanses of open water . The Canadian high Artic and northern Greenland could be the best refuges for polar bears , and even in those areas the ice will disappear if greenhouse gases aren't curbed.
Polar bears are strong swimmers , but swimming long distances in open water is draining and can be fatal . In 2008 a radio collared bear with a yearling cub swam an astounding 427 miles to reach the ice off the northern Alaska coast , The cubs didn't make it . females face especially hard times . Malnourished males may kill and eat the cubs ... and their mothers ... behavior scientists believe may become common as food diminishes .
Male polar bears may eat young bears (above) , so mothers are ever vigilant Photographer Florian Schutz watched a Svalbard male eat a baby cub.
from childhood we create a picture of our physical world : The shy is blue , the Arctic is white . But before this century ends ... and perhaps much sooner ... most of the arctic is perdicted to be b lue water every summer . Can a Arctic support polar bears ? Only in the short run .
Currents still cram drifting sea ice against the Canadian Acrtic Islands and northern Greenland in summer , creating pockets that may retain enough ice to support polar bears through this century . If we can reduce the warming of the atmosphere . It will not be too late for polar bears , but "if the world keeps warming , ultimately even those last refuges will fail to sustain the icon of the Arctic .
Write letters to your government from the atae and national level , Your voice will count . You can also get information from the sites listed below. The more informed you are about Climate Change /Global Warming the more you will understand how drastic the situation is.
Well done Baby.
ReplyDeleteI think the Partners in Crime are making some ripples in the water.
The more rocks you throw , the more ripples you make.
The more you ladies put information out there the more people will notice.
Gil
Thankyou very much kind 'Sir.'
ReplyDeleteAny information on the subject will also be welcome.