Global Warming Threatens the Future of Polar Bears
Polar bears could be extinct by 2100. These majestic Arctic mammals are being threatened by global warming, and, if current trends continue, two-thirds of the world’s polar bear population will be gone in the next 50 years.
The rising temperature of the globe is causing the melting of the polar ice caps. Polar bears, unfortunately, rely on ice to live, rest, breed, and raise their young. Alaskan polar bears use pack ice as their primary summer habitat. Snow cover is necessary to make dens to provide protection and insulation for bear cubs. Additionally, polar bears do most of their hunting from the ice. Areas of shorefast ice attract seals and thus provide polar bears with ideal hunting grounds. It is difficult for bears to catch seals in open water, so ice is an essential part of their feeding.
Due to global warming, however, sea ice has been decreasing by about 8%, or 386,000 square miles, per year – an area equivalent to the size of Texas and Arizona combined. Polar bears are quickly losing their territory. With fewer ice drifts, bears are forced to spend more time on land or swim for many miles, both of which are detriments to the bears’ well-being. Travel on slushy land is difficult for the bears, and their primary food source, seals, are water creatures. This has led polar bears to scavenge in settled areas, like village dumps and Native subsistence whale carcasses. Besides not being satisfying for the bears, this is also dangerous for the humans in those areas!
Spending more time swimming is not an acceptable alternative to ice lifestyle either. Polar bears store fat to enable survival in cold weather, but swimming longer distances uses this fat up. As a result, have less energy and need more food to survive. In 2004, for the first time, four polar bears were documented as having drowned trying to swim from land to distant ice. Many polar bears have also died of starvation, or have fallen victims to cannibalization by other starving bears. Additional swimming is also bad for polar bear cubs, which can only spend 10 minutes in icy Arctic water or else they risk freezing to death.
Declines in fat reserves incurred by excess walking and swimming are also negatively impacting reproduction. Polar bears already have a low reproductive rate, as they reach maturity around five years old, only produce small litters, and can only breed once every three years. The new problems from global warming are causing fewer and fewer cubs to be born. Loss of fat reserves lead to numerous issues, including delay of maturity, inadequate amount of fat to hibernate during pregnancy, smaller litter sizes, lighter cubs, and lower survival rates.
It is imperative that we take action now to save the polar bears. Globally, dependence on fossil fuels and greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced. Laws must be passed to protect against direct killing; trophy hunting of polar bears is common in Canada and Russia. We need to protect polar bears from external, controllable stressors while we work to reverse the effects of global warming.
As an individual, you can make a difference. Jeffrey Flocken, the DC office director for the International Fund for Animal Welfare, recommends the following steps: “1- reduce, reuse, recycle; 2- save energy; 3- cut wasteful travel, walk or take mass transit instead; and 4- encourage others to change.” By doing these four simple things, you can help save the polar bears and other animals that are being threatened by global warming.
For more information, visit ifaw.org.
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