Warming Climate May Put Chill On Arctic Polar Bear Population:
The new research suggests that progressively earlier breakup of the Arctic sea ice, stimulated by climate warming, shortens the spring hunting season for female polar bears in Western Hudson Bay and is likely responsible for the continuing fall in the average weight of these bears. As females become lighter, their ability to reproduce and the survival of their young decline. Also, as the bears become thinner, they are more likely to push into human settlements for food, giving the impression that the population is increasing. The study will be published this week in the September issue of the Journal Arctic.
- Log in to post comments
More like this
It's not just Alaskan governors who have a problem with treating polar bears as a threatened species. For some reason, a lot of people who just can't bring themselves to accept the idea that we're heating up the planet seem to have it in for poor old Ursus maritimus. A year ago, the journal…
Ron Bailey reflexively jumps to the defence of Bjorn Lomborg:
Begley cites three examples from Friel about Lomborg's errors, e.g., polar bear population trends and climate change, human deaths from heat versus cold, and the implications of Antarctic ice shelf disintegration. You can read Begley's…
Throughout most of the world humans have exterminated carnivores in order to keep their places of habitation safe, and while large carnivores still exist in patches we have a sort of "You keep to your side, I'll keep to my side," sort of attitude towards them. The problem, however, is that we keep…
And they don't come more mega than polar bears. There's a new report out, ClimateFeedback has blogged it, so I feel duty bound to snark about it.
Skipping rapidly over the press release (note how the "will" of the title is "could" in the text) we come to the reports themselves. And how nice: there…