WWF at work: Protecting polar bears
Apr 2nd, 2010 by wwftravel
- A female polar bear with her two young cubs near Churchill, Manitoba, Canada. © David Jenkins / WWF-Canada
The iconic polar bear is among the world’s 10 most threatened species – this according to WWF’s Annual Watch List, which examines how a host of threats, including climate change and habitat loss, threaten the long-term survival of many animals.
Climate change has emerges as the clear threat to polar bears and many other species, according to the report. As a result of climate change, annual sea ice in the Arctic is melting earlier in the spring and forming later in the autumn. Sadly, the ice has declined to the lowest levels on record.
That means that polar bears are left with less time on the ice to hunt for food and build up their fat reserves and more time fasting on land, according to the findings of WWF-funded research. Skinnier and hungrier polar bears thus must cope with grave challenges to their survival.
“We have an urgent window of opportunity in which to step up and pull back some of the world’s most splendid animals from the brink of extinction,” says Dr. Sybille Klenzendorf, WWF’s managing director of species conservation.
Studies suggest that two-thirds of the world’s polar bear population could be gone by 2050. And if current warming trends continue unabated, WWF scientists and other researchers believe that polar bears may disappear altogether within 100 years.
WWF is intent on preventing this from happening. The organization funds field research by the world’s foremost polar bear experts to study how global warming will affect the long-term condition of polar bear populations. Near Churchill, Canada, WWF-funded scientists venture out via helicopter to monitor Western Hudson Bay polar bear populations to examine long-term changes in condition and reproduction caused by global warming.
- Close up of an ear tag on a darted polar bear near Churchill, Manitoba, Canada. © Kean MOYNIHAN / WWF-Canada
WWF works to protect critical polar bear habitat by working with governments and industry to reduce threats from shipping and oil and gas development in the region and with communities to reduce human-bear conflict in areas where bears are already stranded on land for longer periods of time due to lack of ice.
WWF-Russia and WWF-US have launched a joint project in the Bering Sea to create innovative management strategies for polar bears—including recommendations for the protection of denning sites, implementation of hunting regulations and the creation of “Polar Bear Brigades” in coastal villages to reduce human-bear conflicts.
And along with other conservation groups, WWF successfully lobbied the U.S. government in 2008 to declare the polar bear a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. In doing so, the government has acknowledged for the first time that climate change is putting a species of wildlife at risk of extinction.
Join WWF’s Classic Polar Bears tour in Churchill, Canada.If you enjoyed this article, you might also like Nature’s close up: The king of the Arctic.
I was returning from a trip to the town of Gaspe, Quebec this week and noticed at least two billboards asking if the public has any suggestions to help the polar bear population, let us know. It got me thinking about how ice flows that polar bears need to rest from their long swims and also to give birth to their young are dwindling and I wondered if anyone had thought about building artificial ice flow platforms, similar to a diving or swimming platform in a lake, to help the polar bears out. I’m not sure of their construction whether they would have to be anchored differently than a swimming platform or if a material other than wood needs to be used, but they might help their situation. The thought of those beautiful creatures dying off because of global warming issues saddens me and seems as if we humans caused the imbalance, maybe we can help them with some artificial ice flows. If you are not too busy, let me know what you think of the idea. Thank you for your work and consideration of this matter. Kim Sonmor (nee Barclay), Sherbrooke Quebec, Canada