For the second time in two weeks a polar bear was sighted in Iceland – and then shot dead.

Polar bear sightings are relatively rare on the island nation (at least until two weeks ago) since getting to Iceland means bears are forced to swim hundreds of miles through icy waters far from their typical Arctic habitat.

Due to harsh criticism after the first polar bear was shot two weeks ago, authorities in Iceland said they would attempt to subdue and capture the second bear after it was discovered by a young girl walking her dog.

The chief veterinarian for the Copenhagen Zoo was flown in to help wrangle the animal late last Tuesday, but it all came to naught later that night. Police and the vet tried to get close enough to the bear to shoot it with an anaesthetiser but as they approached the bear ran in a panic – apparently toward a group of reporters. Afraid of losing control of the situation and having the bear eat a journalist, police “decided to shoot it”.

Copenhagen Zoo spokesman Bengt Holst said that Icelandic authorities made the right decision.

“It was a security problem” Holst told reporters (“Indeed!” is what I can imagine reporters dumb enough to be unprotected and in range of the poor animal).

Two polar bears making the icy swim hundreds of miles to Iceland in as many weeks “lends credence” to biologist’s determination that climate change is is destroying the arctic habitat of the polar bear, forcing them to swim farther and farther afield in search of their typical diet of ringed or bearded seals.

While I think a single occurrence, even two incidents back-to-back, of a polar bear making the unusual journey to Iceland is not in and of itself  definitive proof of anything, it certainly serves as pieces to the puzzle; clues to either take seriously or dismiss without thought. My research indicates there have been some 600 recorded sightings of Polar Bears in Iceland. The last one in 1993, and before that in 1988.

Beyond the needless death of two great animals, it is also frustrating to see the deniers and skeptic “wanna-bes” coming out of the woodwork on the heels of this story (as I’ve said before, true skepticism requires a logical thought process and some notion of a well-formed argument).

Unfounded statements like “There are 3 times as many polar bears as there were 50 years ago” – Or assertions that “Polar bears are growing in numbers” or that “…the world hasn’t warmed since 1998” (these last two from Andrew Bolt who simply doesn’t know what he’s talking about and isn’t afraid to show it) are just a few examples of how denialism is sadly alive and well, and unfortunately riding in on the backs of two polar bears that came to a tragic end.

Sources and Further Reading
Science Daily
AFP
The Age
Global Warming is Real.com

 

 

 

  

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Can I see a show of hands from anyone who is surprised by this?

It is reported today that the state of Alaska plans to sue the federal government in an attempt to block the Department of Interior from listing the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act.

Republican governor Sarah Palin said that the polar bear does not need additional protections and listing the bear as endangered will slow development in the state.

When Department of Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne announced the decision last week, he made it clear that he didn’t intend on letting it get in the way of oil and gas development, giving a press statement last week fraught with loopholes designed to avoid full enforcement of the law.

That isn’t good enough for the state of Alaska. Attorney General Steven Daugherty insists there is no need to protect a

healthy population (of polar bears) based on uncertain climate models”.

Governor Palin adding that

Climate models that predict continued loss of sea ice, the main habitat of polar bears, during summers are unreliable.

Oh really?

She’s either grossly misinformed or intentionally misleading, and both are unbecoming,”

shot back Kassie Siegel of the Center for Biological Diversity,

Alaska deserves better.”

Siegel said it was unconscionable for Palin to ignore overwhelming evidence of global warming’s threat to sea ice, the polar bear’s habitat.

Even the Bush administration can’t deny the reality of global warming. The governor is aligning herself and the state of Alaska with the most discredited, fringe, extreme viewpoints by denying this.”

In the meantime, several environmental groups including Siegel’s Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace, and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) have started legal action against the Bush administration challenging the “special rules” or “4(d) rule” attached to the Department of Interior’s ruling that reduce the protections normally required of such a listing (think of Bush and his “signing statements” allowing him to ignore laws he doesn’t like).

Perhaps what we need now is Senator Inhofe to trot out his expert – the Marketing Professor…

Then again, maybe not.

Sources and Further Reading
Reuters
Associated Press

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I applaud the decision from the Department if Interior to include the polar bear on the endangered species list – even if there’s just a little bit of a “kicking and screaming the whole way” flavor to it.

With that said, the very headline of the press release from the DOI sounded ominously like a loophole:

Secretary Kempthorne Announces Decision to Protect Polar Bears under Endangered Species Act:
Rule will allow continuation of vital energy production in Alaska

And that’s just in the headline. It goes on from there to state that the decision will

…be accompanied by administrative guidance and a rule” (uh oh) “that defines the scope of impact my decision will have” (as in none?) “in order to protect the polar bear while limiting unintended harm to the society and economy of the United States” (take that all you big angry bears…)

While acknowledging that the polar bear is listed as a direct result of climate change, Kempthorne wanted

…to make it clear that this listing will not stop global climate change… That is why I am taking administrative and regulatory action to make certain the ESA (endangered species act) isn’t abused” (abused? Did you just have lunch with James Inhofe?) “…to make global warming polices.” (Read the full press release from the Department of Interior)

So the polar bear is listed under the Endangered Species Act – kinda. It’s listed because of it’s diminishing habitat from global warming, but through DOI “guidance” the protecting the bear under ESA does not extend to halting the very activity that further destroys the bear’s habitat and accelerates climate change.

Makes your head spin doesn’t it?

The Natural Resource Defense Council and Sierra Club have both weighed in with their own words of caution.

 

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It has been just announced that the Department of Interior – one day short of the court mandated deadline – has decided to list the polar bear as an endangered species due to declining arctic sea ice.  

The polar bear is the first species to be so listed as a result of climate change.

Expect to hear much bluster from Senator Inhofe and his marketing experts. Kudos to the DOI for finally making the decision and acting appropriately.

Sources and Further Reading
Associated Press
CNN
National Post, Canada

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Aww, c’mon, that isn’t very nice.

But really, to hear Inhofe talk about it, along with his media shills, you’d think that with so darn many “big angry bears” running around there’s an “over population” problem, to quote Inhofe’s own words while he yuks it up Glenn Beck. Ignorance is sooo fascinating.

The repeated delays in making a determination on whether to list the polar bear as endangered continues – hopefully not for very much longer. The Department of Interior missed it’s first deadline for determining the status of the polar bear after Department of Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne proposed listing the bear as “threatened” which set in motion the process that mandates a final decision based on the recommendation of the US Fish & Game service within one year. (the deadline passed over four months ago).

Since that time James Inhofe – like a bad cold that does little good, refuses to go away, and makes you feel awful –presented an “expert” at a Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing on January 30^th to show how wrong international scientists (see my previous post about my chat with biologist Nick Lunn) and Department of Interior scientists are about polar bears and their habitat – not to mention the IPCC, Al Gore, etc. ad nauseum.

Inhofe’s expert is one Dr. J. Scott Armstrong Ph.D., a professor of marketing at The Wharton School University in Pennsylvania. You read that right, my friend, Inhofe found, as his polar bear expert, a professor of marketing. He’s apparently really good at forecasting (better than scientists working in their own field of expertise) and here’s what he has to say about polar bears.

A follow-up hearing for the committee was then held on April 2^nd to look into the Bush administration’s foot-dragging on the issue. As if to underscore the committee’s concerns about their motives, nobody from the administration bothered to show up for the hearing.

Finally, having had enough, a federal judge on April 29^th gave the Department of Interior until this Thursday to make a decision about the polar bear.

U.S District Judge Claudia Wilken said in her ruling in a suit brought by the Center for Biological Diversity and other conservation groups:

Defendants have been in violation of the law requiring them to publish the listing determination for nearly 120 days. Other than the general complexity of finalizing the rule, Defendants offer no specific facts that would justify the delay, much less further delay

We’re sorry that the issue is so complex – though it didn’t seem to take Dr. Armstrong that long to come to the conclusion that the general weight of the evidence from scientists studying polar bears in the field are all wrong – but it continues to strike me as odd how the same tactics are repeatedly employed by the likes of Mr. Inhofe. Namely confusing issues through a general ignorance of science, deceptive “marketing” (his expert is a Dr. of marketing after all), foot-dragging, and blatant political posturing.

A tortured truth is rarely to be believed.

In the meantime, we wait with expectant anticipation for the Department of Interior’s decision this Thursday. Kempthorne wouldn’t dare ignore a direct court order – would he?

Sources and Further Reading
Grist
DeSmogBlog – Alaska Goes Denier Shopping
Polar Bears International

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Well, this doesn’t seem like news to anyone following the Arctic sea ice melt of 2007, but I guess it’s official…

Reuters today reported that the WWF (formally the World Wildlife Federation) has published findings that indicate previous “expert assessments” (IPCC?) have underestimated the rate at which ice is retreating in Greenland and all across the Arctic region.

Not only is summer ice retreating to record levels, but the “multi-year” ice cover is diminishing in both area and thickness, making it prone to summer melt as well.

A warming Arctic has the dangerous potential of driving global temperatures beyond what current modeling indicates for the 21^st century.

WWF has called upon the Arctic nations, including Canada, the United States, Russia, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Denmark to work together to help deal with the challenges and adapt to changes that have already affected all aspects of Arctic ecology, including the northern oceans, ice sheets, snow, and permafrost.

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My recent adventure participating in the Earthwatch expedition based at the Churchill Northern Studies Centre presented a unique opportunity for a one-on-one discussion with Dr. Nick Lunn of the Canadian Wildlife Service. Nick is one of a handful of scientists focusing their efforts, knowledge, and talent on studying the polar bear.

In other words, Nick is a polar bear expert.

Nick arrived at the Churchill Northern Studies Centre just as our team was finishing up their work sampling and monitoring snowpack conditions in the area. I and one other team member stayed behind an extra day waiting for the train to take us back to Winnipeg (a story in itself) and our lives “down south”, leaving just two CNSC staff, Nick, my fellow EW teammate Chris, and I fending for ourselves for the evening.

By asking Nick his opinion on the delayed decision by the U.S. on whether to list the polar bear as endangered, I had the good fortune of opening Nick up for what turned into a nearly two-hour discussion on polar bears, climate change, and environmental policy both in Canada and the United States.

Here are some highlights of our discussion:

1. There Are More Polar Bears Now Than Ever! At Least That’s What the Wall Street Journal and the Heartland Institute Says…

   Oh really?

   It isn’t hard to find media reports stating that polar bear populations are at historic highs – up to 25,000 now from a low of 5,000 or so in the 50’s or 60’s. This gets a chuckle from Nick. Look in any of those reports for the source of their conjecture. The fact is nobody was even paying attention to polar bear numbers in the 50’s or 60’s, much less conducting a scientifically sound census survey. So where do they come up with those numbers? Hmm… Good question.  

   In the 50’s and 60’s polar bear were being shot, killed, hunted down wholesale. It has only been within the past couple of decades that scientists, government leaders, and wildlife managers have realized that it might be prudent to put some limits on the carnage to assess what it is we have in the way of polar bears and to begin serious, ongoing scientific study of them.

   What happens when uncontrolled hunting is stopped? Gosh, it seems there may have been some recovery in polar bear populations due to the alleviated stress from hunting. (Incidentally, 500 bears are still harvested every year in Canada.) 

   When you hear anyone authoritatively pronouncing that polar bear numbers have recovered from 5000 to 25,000 just know that they’re simply guessing. Right off the bat a reason to question the veracity of their argument. (And when the Wall Street journal says anything about environmental policy, assume they likely don’t know a whit about what they’re talking about.) 

2. Polar Bears in the Western Hudson Bay Region 

   Churchill, Manitoba is widely know as the Polar Bear Capital of the World, strategically located in the midst of one of the world’s 13 polar bear populations. While it is possible to encounter a bear at any time in or around the Churchill area, the crowds come in October and November – bear “high season” – to catch a glimpse of a bear while riding in the comfort of a  “tundra buggy” (I say you haven’t really experienced the area until you’ve taken a ride in a dread sled – but again, that’s another story). There are other attractions in Churchill; historic forts from the Hudson Bay Company days to Beluga whale watching and birding. But Polar Bears are what give Churchill a reason to call itself a “world capital”.

   This may not last for very much longer and is why Nick, studying the Western Hudson Bay population as he does, says he considers himself a historian. Those are his words, not mine. The population in the Western Hudson Bay region has declined 22% in 17 years, to less than 1000 bears. 

   The condition of adult bears has steadily been decreasing, with the average weight of females declining toward a threshold at which the chances of it bearing viable cubs becomes doubtful. As Nick explained, that threshold may be reached, if the trends continue as they have, as soon as 2012. 

   The principal cause for the deteriorating condition of this population of bears is the early break-up of sea ice. Bears have to go further and work harder to find their principal source of food, the ring seal, and thus the female gives birth to her cubs more emaciated and less able to nurture her cubs. More cubs are not surviving to adulthood. The overall threat to the population is that current generations of bear will not be replaced.

3. Two out of Thirteen

   Again, you’ll find plenty to media reports speaking to the thriving polar bear populations around the world. Just not from research scientists that are actually studying them in the field. Yes, by that I mean scientists that get their butt out from behind a desk, put on their long-johns, and actually go into the arctic and get up close and personal not only with the bear, but with the harsh conditions in the arctic. 

   I encourage you to go out and canvas your own sources of information on this, but this is what I got from Nick (the polar bear expert, while we chatted near the arctic circle one evening):

   Of the thirteen populations of polar bear in the world, only two are considered as thriving, as many as five may currently be stable, and the rest are either threatened, in decline, or there is simply not enough data to make a reliable assessment.

   Heck, that doesn’t sound so bad, does it? Maybe those giggling fools from the Wall Street Journal are right!

   Not bloody likely. The Western Hudson Bay region is one of the most studied populations in the world, so the data set for these bears is the most complete and accurate available. The low arctic region they inhabit is an ecosystem highly vulnerable to climate change, and so it is likely that what we are seeing with this population will continue to spread throughout all circumpolar bear populations as environmental changes in the north accelerate.

4. Who Cares?

   The polar bear has become the poster child for global warming. When people think of global warming, they likely conjure up an image of a cute cuddly bear cub. In the Western Hudson Bay, the chances are ever increasing that that cute bear cub won’t make it to adulthood.

   But does it really matter? If there are no polar bears around in a few decades, will it really chance anything in our daily lives? Aren’t attempts to list the polar bear as endangered or threatened just liberal attempts to control our lives and put the UN in charge of us all? Isn’t this all just alarmist clap-trap by tree-hugging global warming fanatics? (Well, if you actually believe those last two statements then I’ve got nothing for you. Go forth and delude yourselves if you must.)

   The polar bear is, of course, just one aspect of a finely balanced and fragile ecosystem; one that is stressed and changing fast. We ignore those changes in the arctic, to the polar bear, and all that supports and depends on it, to our own peril.

   As goes the polar bear, we have to wonder, goes the rest of the world?

   Then we’ll all be historians.

Further Reading
Polar Bear Institute
Grist
Canadian Wildlife Service

Photo Credit: Polar Bear International

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After the research expedition I was participating in officially ended last week, I spend a couple extra days along with another team member helping Krista (a staff at the Churchill Northern Studies Centre) to wrap things up for our team.

Just as our team was leaving, Nick Lunn arrived to set up several weeks of polar bear research. Nick is a leading expert on Polar Bears, and his research is sought out by other scientists, governments, journalists, and policy-makers from around the world.

With our team mostly gone, CNSC was pretty much a ghost town for the last two days I was there. At dinner one night I had the good fortune of having a nearly two-hour discussion with Nick on polar bears, climate change, and environmental policy.

This added to my plethora of notes I collected during the my own research project assisting Dr. Kershaw’s work (as described in earlier posts).

Next week, upon my final return home, I will start disseminating those notes and my thoughts on what I have learned these past few weeks.

Stay tuned.

 

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