Roadrunner Wildlife Attractors Predator Calls CD, Menifee, CA (2026)

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10/07/2016

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09/20/2016

Threats to Polar Bears:

Polar bears are in serious danger of going extinct due to global warming. The bears were the first vertebrate species to be listed by the U.S. Endangered Species Act as threatened by extinction primarily because of global warming. This listing happened in 2008 because of the ongoing loss of critical habitat for polar bears, the arctic sea ice on which they live and depend to hunt their almost exclusive prey, seals.

Rising temperatures in the world’s oceans are causing sea ice to disappear for longer and longer periods during the late summer, leaving polar bears insufficient time to hunt. This is a worldwide problem, and the Endangered Species Act has listed polar bears as threatened everywhere in the world they occur. Polar bears can only survive in areas where the oceans freeze, allowing them to hunt seals living under, on, or in the frozen polar ice cap.

>> Learn more about polar bears and global warming

Orbiting satellites have been able to track the seasonal extent of sea ice since 1979, and the trends are very disturbing for the future of the polar bear. The minimum extent of sea ice occurs in mid-September and new records lows for this minimum are now regular events. The most recent minimum low was set in 2012, surpassing the previous minimum of 2007. The trend is for the last summer sea ice in the arctic to be farther and farther from shore, making it necessary for polar bears to swim increasingly long distances from shore to reach the ice. Worse, the last remaining sea ice is over deep and unproductive waters that yield less prey.

In the southernmost populations around Canada’s Hudson Bay, the sea ice does not persist throughout the summer. We can expect to see a similar trend when the sea ice disappears in the arctic. In Hudson Bay, polar bears now spend summer months on shore when the ice has melted and there is no ice platform from which to hunt seals. As a result, they must fast for months. Remarkably, Hudson Bay polar bears have been able to catch enough seals during the winter to tide them over during this period of on-shore fasting. But this situation is changing fast because of climate change. Now the ice is melting earlier and forming up later, leaving an ever-shorter period in which to hunt. Hudson Bay bears are now much skinnier, have fewer cubs, the cubs they do have more frequently don’t survive to adulthood, and the interval between successful litters is growing. There is also more cannibalism of cubs by male bears.

The patterns seen in Hudson Bay are beginning to occur now in more northern populations. This pattern is especially well documented on the north Coast of Alaska but appears to be the case worldwide. The increasing amount of open water between shore and the sea creates long swims for polar bears. During this long swim, cubs and adult bears have died. If they do reach the remaining ice it is over unproductive deep water where there are few seals to hunt.

Additionally development is increasing in ocean floor exploratioin and offshore oil extraction in the open waters that were previously sealed by frozen ice. This brings people, disturbance and potentially ruinous oil spills to the previously pristine arctic polar bear habitat.

Polar bears need our help and protection to ensure a long, healthy future for the species. The best way you can help polar bears is by reducing your carbon emissions and working with National Wildlife Federation to campaign for reductions in global warming pollutants.

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