From NPR: The Inconvenient Truth About Polar Bears
In 2008, reports of polar bears’ inevitable march toward extinction gripped headlines. Stories of thinning Arctic ice and even polar bear cannibalism combined to make these predators into a powerful symbol in the debate about climate change.
The headlines caught Zac Unger’s attention, and he decided to write a book about the bears.
Unger made a plan to move to Churchill, Manitoba, a flat, gray place on the Hudson Bay in northern Canada accessible only by train or plane. For a few months out of the year, as the bay starts to freeze, tiny Churchill boasts as many polar bears as it does people.
Unger packed up his wife and three small kids, and set out with a big bold idea. He wanted to write the quintessential requiem of how human-caused climate change was killing off these magnificent beasts.
In the end, he came away with something totally different, Unger tells NPR’s Laura Sullivan.
Interview Highlights
On wanting to write the next great environmental tract
“My humble plan was to become a hero of the environmental movement. I was going to go up to the Canadian Arctic, I was going to write this mournful elegy for the polar bears, at which point I’d be hailed as the next coming of John Muir and borne aloft on the shoulders of my environmental compatriots …
“So when I got up there, I started realizing polar bears were not in as bad a shape as the conventional wisdom had led me to believe, which was actually very heartening, but didn’t fit well with the book I’d been planning to write.
“… There are far more polar bears alive today than there were 40 years ago. … In 1973, there was a global hunting ban. So once hunting was dramatically reduced, the population exploded. This is not to say that global warming is not real or is not a problem for the polar bears. But polar bear populations are large, and the truth is that we can’t look at it as a monolithic population that is all going one way or another.”
On moving his family to “Polar Bear Capital of the World”
“We were in this town in northern Manitoba where polar bears literally will walk down Main Street. There are polar bears in this town. People will leave their cars and houses unlocked, and it’s perfectly good form just to duck into any open door you can find when there’s a polar bear chasing you.
“People use what they call Churchill welcome mats, which is a piece of plywood laid down in front of the door or leaned up against the door with hundreds of nails sticking out so that when the polar bear comes up to pad across your porch, he’s going to get a paw full of sharp nails.”
Zac Unger has worked as a firefighter and paramedic for the Oakland Fire Department. He is also the author of Working Fire: The Making of a Fireman.
Courtesy De Capo Press
On Churchill’s strategies for living among bears
“There are definitely polar bears that come into town; there are definitely polar bears that will eat people’s dogs. But Churchill has developed an innovative polar bear alert program. The way it works is you dial a phone number — 675-BEAR — if you see a bear, and a bunch of wildlife conservation officers will come by in a truck with a bunch of guns. And they try really hard not to harm the bears, and they kind of scare the bears out of town. They have a progression that they use: First, they will fire firecracker shells; then they move up to rubber bullets; and as a last resort, they’ll move up to real bullets.
“They don’t want to do that. These are conservation officers so their job is to keep bears safe. Churchill also has a polar bear jail. These are for bears who keep coming into town and can’t be hazed out of town. And what they’ll do is they will trap these bears and put them in the polar bear jail, which is just a great big decommissioned military building. And they will give them no food, and they’re given only snow to drink and then they wait until the bay freezes up. And when the bay freezes up, these bears can be released to go back out on the ice.
“[The bears] don’t want to be in town, they’re just waiting for the ice to freeze. But if they’re a hassle in town, put them in jail, give them a short sentence, and the problem is solved.”
On trick-or-treating when polar bears might be lurking around the corner
“Halloween is when you’re supposed to go up with lots of food and run around with your kids. So we were up there for Halloween … and so what they do is when you go out trick-or-treating you go out with somebody who has a gun — whether it’s a police officer, or a volunteer or someone from the military. They all come out and they help you go trick-or-treating. Now, they have one rule, which is that kids can’t dress in anything white — no princesses, no ghosts — because you don’t want to be dressed as something white in the darkness when there’s a bunch of guys with guns looking for polar bears.”
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Maybe now we’ll see far less use of this photoshopped image, dubbed Ursus Bogus:
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In related news: Is polar bear scientist Monnett still under investigation?
Polar bear scientist Charles Monnett’s long-running entanglement with bureaucratic investigations into the quality and ethics of his work may not be over, despite a finding by his government employer in September that he could return to work. At the time, Monnett was delivered the equivalent of a slap on the hand — a written reprimand for sharing work emails with environmentalists.
He was cleared of more damning allegations that his science was bad, his motives questionable. Yet according to attorney Jeff Ruch, who has represented Monnett throughout the investigation, the Office of the Inspector General has confirmed the case remains open. Agents with the Inspector General’s office conducted the inquiry into Monnett’s work and last fall returned their analysis to the Bureau of Ocean and Energy Management (BOEM), Monnett’s employer. The bureau determined there could be evidence of criminal wrongdoing and scientific misconduct, but left it to BOEM to decide how to interpret the Inspector General’s findings and what, if anything, to do about it.
Intense scrutiny of Monnett at the hands of government investigators quickly became an ongoing saga with political implications. When the investigation began, Monnett worked for the Minerals Management Service, an agency that not only conducted research into marine mammals, but which also permitted oil and gas exploration in Arctic waters. Tensions were growing among scientists who felt their observations were being swept under the rug to ease the permitting process.
Polar bears: powerful symbol
Meanwhile, the prospect of drowning polar bears became a powerful symbol. Monnett and a co-author, Dr. Jeffrey Gleason, made brief reference to drowned bears in a 2006 journal article. During a 2004 overflight to survey bowhead whales in Alaska’s arctic. Monnett and his colleagues witnessed what they believed were four dead bears floating in the Arctic Ocean. It was the first published documentation of dead bears at sea, and Monnett and Dr. Jeffrey Gleason surmised that the number of dead bears would increase as sea ice melted. At some point during the investigation, Monnett’s methods for documenting the deaths and putting them into context became a target of the inquiry. Investigators, who were vague during much of the process, would only say scientific misconduct, and perhaps miscalculations, were one aspect of concern regarding the scientist’s work.
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And that is all it took for Al Jazeera Gore to run with it in An Inconvenient Truth:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whWvXkK0HJ8
UPDATE: some population numbers via Andrew Bolt:
Polar bear numbers as estimated in 2009 by the Polar Bear Specialist Group of the IUCN Species Survival Commission: 20,000 – 25,000.
Polar bear numbers as estimated in 2012 by the Polar Bear Specialist Group of the IUCN Species Survival Commission: 22,600 – 32,100.
“My humble plan was to become a hero of the environmental movement”
Megalomania ??
Yet another myth is destroyed!
Curse you, Reality!
I do believe that an Inuit elder, somewhere along the way, made the remark that how would these scientists ever know anything about Ursus Maritimus if all they did was fly over the white ice looking for a white bear? Implicit in the remark was “maybe come down among them to see that they thrive” or somesuch. Kudos to Zac Unger for actually revealing his motive…and maybe a hint of ‘conversion’…but really, despite his Muirean fantasy, he is yet another skeptical voice that will largely remain silent in the din of alarmist claims (those scoffed at by the Inuit). Just like the uninformed, to “cuteify” a large and powerful predator which, but for the existence of the thunder stick, doesn’t give two hoots about climate change, Coca Cola, or the inventors of said. We’re just breakfast.
I’m guessing that the innate beauty of a highly evolved super-predator palls a little bit when they start predating on you….
“My humble plan was to become a hero of the environmental movement.”
A therein lies the central motivation (besides money) for all of our CAGW climate “science” heroes…
Just because one guy on NPR said this, doesn’t mean NPR “gets it.” This will get minimum airtime and be quickly buried.
Oh the tragedy.
Course he could have actually asked a northern resident and saved his family the expense, but [I] hope the learning experience pays off for him and [his] education is shared by other currently gulled people.
Sarc on;
But now there are too many bears, if their rate of reproduction continues they will consume all the seals and starve.
We must save this great icon of the environmentalists, all concerned saviours of the planet must do their bit.
Come to Churchill Manitoba and hug a polar bear, boost their food source, save the polar bear.
Yes Sarc, although the longer I observe the CAGW believers, the more certain I become that, Hug a Polar Bear TV, would be a profitable venture.
It is scary to contemplate that people are so delusional with respect to nature, that they would pay for the privilege of being filmed as they commit suicide by wild animal.
They only thing that prevents such a venture,other than ethics, is the cruelty to wildlife act.
Ugh spell check, I,, his
There is a very mundane aspect to this discussion. The Inuit can make a lot of money when well-heeled US citizens come north to hunt polar bears. I dont know the actual figure, but it is 5 figures per bear. And the hunter only takes the skin, and the Inuit use the rest. It is a very lucrative process. As long as the US restricts the import of polar bear skins, the Inuit are deprived of a useful source of income
and the truth is that we can’t look at it as a monolithic population
=========
and who was the loon that did
Good sign – Coca Cola has left the wagon – the polar bear are back on the bottles and cans again.
I caught the first of the “interview” and, unfortunately, the interviewer and subject never put the 2 + 2 together regarding “climate change”. Delusional reporting, the “hallmark” of NPR on environmental “reporting”
Merely a curious anomaly and nothing more. Move along, nothing to see here. NPR is staffed by ideologues and even having polar bears overrun their office and eat the receptionist would not change their editorial opinions.
Matthew W says:
February 4, 2013 at 8:59 am
“My humble plan was to become a hero of the environmental movement”
Megalomania ??
—
No. It’s called irony.
Coke is not in danger of running out of Mascots any time soon.
Polar bears are doing very well,thank you. And will continue to do so. If a little bit of warm-up is fatal to them,how the heck did they get through the MWP??? Lot’s of ice cubes with their seal?
The professional worriers of NPR inadvertently let one slip through the cracks, but if you look at the story’s comments you’ll see the outrage among the faithful.
Good gosh, I never fully realized what a menace polar bears must be to those who live near them! Why were we worried about these monsters again?
That’s too bad. Nothing says Global Warming/Climate Change Alarmism like polar bears falling from the sky, splatting on cars and pavement:
Sigh. Alarmism just isn’t what it used to be.
Michael Palmer says:
February 4, 2013 at 9:35 am
Matthew W says:
February 4, 2013 at 8:59 am
“My humble plan was to become a hero of the environmental movement”
Megalomania ??
—
No. It’s called irony.
———————————————–
Yeah, because Megalomania is a British vintage dragster that was just recently discovered in the Arizona desert and restored to all its original beauty.
http://forums.motortrend.com/70/9176823/motor-trend-classic/4-week-shop-challenge-full-vintage-dragster-restor/index.html
Mike Bromley,
The “scientists” counting the polar bears in Canada are the same knuckleheads who lost a ~40k head herd of Elk for 2.5 years. Elk are brown not white and 40k is a lot of them. There were comments from a couple of Inuit leaders from the area at the time the herd was rediscovered that indicated that they knew where the herd was all along and actually tried to tell the “scientists”.
No, I don’t see megalomania in his wanting to hit a home run with his story. I’d love to hit a home run in my areas of expertise, but most of the time, I just learn a bunch trying. He’s willing to admit his fantasy, and I’d cut him some slack for being honest about his learning experience.
It’s anti-hunting BS. NPR loves anti-hunting messages. Makes you wonder how much real information Unger actually gathered. It couldn’t have taken all of the supposed time he lived there to find this little bit of information.
so, what did he do? Did he talk to tribal elders? Perhaps spend some time reaching the wild bears in one of those bear amusement cages photographers like so much?
Rujholla says:
February 4, 2013 at 9:04 am
Just because one guy on NPR said this, doesn’t mean NPR “gets it.” This will get minimum airtime and be quickly buried.
____________________________
The problem with NPR is that they accept Public Tax funding and then deny that their programming is all too often agenda- driven.
The term “deniers” couldn’t truly be applied to NPR, but the term “liars” would fit.
Unbearable!
Matt says:
February 4, 2013 at 10:12 am
Mike Bromley,
The “scientists” counting the polar bears in Canada are the same knuckleheads who lost a ~40k head herd of Elk for 2.5 years. Elk are brown not white and 40k is a lot of them. There were comments from a couple of Inuit leaders from the area at the time the herd was rediscovered that indicated that they knew where the herd was all along and actually tried to tell the “scientists”.
Elk – as in Wapiti, or caribou? Elk geographic range in North Am. is largely south of both Innuit territory and Caribou ranges.
I often thought that the best cure for the eco-fascists peddling the polar bear myth, would be to send them out on ‘volunteer’ trekking missions across the ice to log and photograph all the bears they see. Of course, they would have to split up into small groups (of 2 or 3 folks?) to cover the area, and couldn’t carry any weapons (wouldn’t want to actually harm any bears), and they would have to carry/pull all their food for a couple of months, etc. Those that return would then deposit their logs and photos with the CPBS (cuddly polar bear society) – and those that don’t will probably be assumed to have provided some bears with a good meal! I wonder how many would actually volunteer, and how many would come back?
With the Northern Hemisphere Sea Ice Anomoly now at -0.63 and the Southern Hemisphere Sea Ica Anomoly at +0.66 we are now above the 1979-2008 average and trending more positive all the time. It’s only a matter of time until we start hearing that humans are causing the next ice age and only massive tax increases will fix it.
This site (http://polarbearscience.com/) is a great place to look for more polar bear information.
@ Mike Bromley, do you mean the nearly 300 000 head of Caribou that they could not find and now will not acknowledge?
@ Kev in UK, an excellent eco-safari business, a peacetime use for our military drones(observation only)and a network TV block buster, “reality TV show”.
Very cost effective as you would know wether to send the pick up flight for sure.
Duster,
Thanks, [you’re] right it would have been caribou. It doesn’t change the point though.
He was told polar bears were endangered by global warming and he believed it until he looked at the evidence.
He was told global warming was caused by CO2 rising and he believed that.
He has not yet looked at the evidence.
Don’t worry about the cuddly polar bear mascot. It is being replaced by the cuddly wolverine mascot. I posted excerpts in Tips and Notes. Links are:
Wolverines versus Warming
http://www.contracostatimes.com/breaking-news/ci_22500332/wolverines-vs-warming-feds-propose-protecting-snow-loving
Climate Change Threatens Wolverines
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-wolverine-climate-change-20130201,0,7165069.story?track=rss
@ Neil Jordan, I would pay cash, to see a enviro- get cuddly with a wolverine. Way too funny, at least a bear will detour around people and their camps most of the time.
Reblogged this on Public Secrets and commented:
And another cherished bit of global-warming dogma pops like a bubble: there are more polar bears than there were 40 years ago.
‘During a 2004 overflight to survey bowhead whales in Alaska’s arctic. Monnett and his colleagues witnessed what they believed were four dead bears floating in the Arctic Ocean. ‘
Its still amazing how much utter nonsense ,which then became articles of faith for ‘the cause ‘ , came from was has poor a piece of research has you can get.
Still once the money started to pour in , and boy has it , you can see why some were not to keen let scientific integrate get in the way of research funding for life .
The irony Inuit , or the actual people on the ground , have been telling them what the real situation is for years , but then what do they know their not ‘climate scientists’
Pity the poor warmistas….The truth is more than they can bear….
” It is being replaced by the cuddly wolverine mascot.”
Wolverine, isn’t that the one where you stick 3 ‘roided up cagefighters and a wolverine in a log cabin, and an hour later release a wolverine with indigestion?…
If they wanted an image of complete harmlessness shouldn’t they use that photo of Obama looking like a hairdresser who’s picked up a shotgun by mistake….
Climate doesn’t kill polar bears, guns do! They were down to about 5,000 and then we stopped shooting them all the time and 40 years later we have 25,000. I know reality is hard for some warmistas to get their head wrapped around but please folks, you’ve been had, played, taken. Now get mad and do something about it!
NPR also carried the AP article mentioned by Neil Jordan, above:
If environmentalists need another (or a different) cause de jour, maybe it is more properly placed on this animal, but their headline is a misrepresentation of the facts they cite in the article. It’s not the warming. It’s the trapping.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=170836317
Apparently, only one wolverine now inhabits Colorado. It wandered down from Yellowstone in 2009, a journey, monitored by radio telemetry and flyovers, of more than 500 miles.
https://www.google.com/search?q=GREATER%20YELLOWSTONE%20WOLVERINE%20PROGRAM%20Practical%2C%20Science-based%20Solutions%20for%20Wolverine%20Conservation&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a
There’s nothing quite like the bear naked truth when it comes to destroying a lie.
Polar bears are dangerous creatures and have been known to stalk and kill humans, so I would not have believed that it was possible, even with the help of knowledgeable guides, to get (on foot) within 35 feet of a bear. But two years ago I joined a small group, to fly into a wilderness lodge 125 miles north of Churchill. The idea was to walk on the tundra (with guides) to photograph the bears of which there were many (I have the photos to prove it). The bears at this time of year (Late November) are in a state of “walking hibernation” as they have had little to eat, other than berries, since the previous May. They moved at a slow graceful gait to conserve energy and despite being ravenous, seemed to be quite disinterested in us. I am sure that this was because of the skillfull leadership of the guides in approaching the bears.
With the exception of a fenced in viewing area, the lodge would not allow guests outside by themselves, and in the fenced area, the feeling was that you were in the zoo and the bears were ambling by to view you. Again boards with nails pointing up were used by the lodge to prevent the bears causing damage to the building, but on occasion, you would see a bear’s head at a window as it peered into the lodge.
On return home, I described the experience to an acquaintance and was asked “..how many dead bears did you see?”
Also on several trips to the Canadian and Greenlandic High Arctic (above 70 degrees north), I have found that the Inuit, who obviously know bears very well, will laugh at anyone suggesting that they are endangered. More to the point they are pests.
There’s a long article by Zac Unger on this topic at Pacific Standard Magazine (online) at http://www.psmag.com/magazines/pacific-standard-cover-story/endangered-polar-bear-global-warming-climate-change-arctic-sea-ice-50450/
It’s definitely worth a read.
More regarding wolverines, seems they’re rebounding in Washington State…but CAGW will kill them anyway.
http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2020260612_wolverinereturnxml.html
Michael Palmer says:
February 4, 2013 at 9:35 am
Matthew W says:
February 4, 2013 at 8:59 am
“My humble plan was to become a hero of the environmental movement”
Megalomania ??
—
No. It’s called irony.
============================================
Maybe “delusions of grandeur” is a better fit !!
Polar bears are robust creatures. Funny how their numbers gone up during the meltdown. I have been telling warmists that hunting is the key. 1,000 per year used to be culled.
Ice free Arctic during the Holocene. Polar bears somehow survived a millennium or more of ice free summers. How did they do that?
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2010.08.016
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2007AGUFMPP11A0203F
http://geology.geoscienceworld.org/cgi/content/abstract/21/3/227
Funny how the extrapolated population number went up when suddenly sponsor money went down… After all the polar bear population has been 20-25 000 since 1970, that’s what have always been claimed.
Increasingly North American Ursines are garbage addicted and are multiplying wildly. We actually have a growing public safety issue on our hands.
The comments there are simply unbelievable.
Example: ” if anything, Mr. Unger’s experience in Churchill indicates that the bears existence is even more grim than I realized.”
I don’t know how people that stupid are still living. Surely they would be dead already from all the kool-aide they’ve consumed over the years….
This report comes a decade after Churchill started employing better garbage management in order to reduce the impact of nuance bears. BTW, the reported decline in the West Hudson population was a direct result of reducing trash. Obviously, it was only a temporary effect.
The only polar bear sub-pops that have ever been recorded as having a shrinking population in the last 50 years are the West Hudson and South Hudson, both of which were as large as they were because of the benefit of garbage from human habitation.
My comment there, which will likely get kicked out in moderation:
Some of you here…good Lord. “…the bears existence is even more grim than I realized.” How can you even type that with a straight face? I would have thought those here with conservationist/environmentalist leanings would be overjoyed at some news that the polar bear population is doing well, almost TOO well in areas. But some of you are the exact opposite, almost pissed-off the polar bears are not doing what they are supposed to be doing: dying. That tells me something about you. You WANT the bears to be dying because you WANT to be morally right and have some justification for driving a Prius and switching to compact fluorescent light bulbs and chastising people for not living sustainably, whatever that means. You WANT man to be “bad” so you can be perceived as morally superior and any news to the contrary pisses you off to no end.
Despite centuries of rising temperatures and declining arctic ice levels, the polar bears are more numerous than ever and might just be thriving due to more open water and greater year-round access to their most favorite of snacks, seals. The polar bear is NOT a canary in a coal mine. Deal with it…
john robertson says:
February 4, 2013 at 11:43 am
@ Neil Jordan, I would pay cash, to see a enviro- get cuddly with a wolverine.
###
Like this?
Don’t try this at home!
Re the lovely bit of self deprecating humour by the author: “My humble plan was to become a hero of the environmental movement.”
I was not going to bother commenting when I saw the first one, but after the third humourless response I feel I have to question whether amongst us CAGW skeptics there is a very high level of humourless characters…..
Matthew W says: February 4, 2013 at 8:59 am
Megalomania ??
Frank K. says: February 4, 2013 at 9:03 am
A therein lies the central motivation (besides money) for all of our CAGW climate “science” heroes…
Matthew W says: February 4, 2013 at 2:31 pm
Maybe “delusions of grandeur” is a better fit !!
I see you haven’t seen the dec Ice and snow report from NOAA http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global-snow/2012/12 … It states: Ice extent across the North Atlantic has been below-average for several consecutive winter seasons, and is related to higher mortality rates for seals in the region. The bearded and ringed seals were recently added to the list of threatened creatures under the Endangered Species Act. During December above-average ice extent was observed in the Bering Sea.
So out go the bears and in come those poor drowning seals… doesn’t say a thing about unusual storms or extremely harsh storms… just global warmer mantra of ice loss. sad.
markx says; …humorless characters….
I hear that polar bear tastes a lot like chicken (drum roll…………… or maybe not).
Humorless indeed, I prefer the more PC term; Humor Challanged.
Cheers, Kevin.
I sort of recall reading about some biologists/scientists/whoever, using tranq darts on polar bears while attempting to relocate them and that a few of them passed out, slid off the ice and sank before they could be grabbed. The bears were in the same area as the ones Monnet discovered and we all know that gasses form during decomp and they will float back to the top.
I believe I read it on WUWT but can’t be sure.
Davet
john robertson says:
February 4, 2013 at 9:09 am
…. Come to Churchill Manitoba and hug a polar bear, boost their food source, save the polar bear.
Yes Sarc, although the longer I observe the CAGW believers, the more certain I become that, Hug a Polar Bear TV, would be a profitable venture.
It is scary to contemplate that people are so delusional with respect to nature, that they would pay for the privilege of being filmed as they commit suicide by wild animal.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I have often had the same thought with Al Gore featured in the “opening ceremony”
Neil Jordan says:
February 4, 2013 at 11:26 am
Don’t worry about the cuddly polar bear mascot. It is being replaced by the cuddly wolverine mascot…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Maybe we can get Al Gore and Jim Hansen to poise with a newly captured wolverine.
DesertYote says:
February 4, 2013 at 4:33 pm
john robertson says:
February 4, 2013 at 11:43 am
@ Neil Jordan, I would pay cash, to see a enviro- get cuddly with a wolverine.
###
Like this?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Reminds me of the guy on TV who was caught tranking the animals he was handling for the camera when one of them died.
pkatt says:
February 4, 2013 at 6:24 pm
I see you haven’t seen the dec Ice and snow report from NOAA http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global-snow/2012/12 … It states: Ice extent across the North Atlantic has been below-average for several consecutive winter seasons, and is related to higher mortality rates for seals in the region…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Bear snacks????
Gail Combs says:
February 4, 2013 at 7:43 pm
DesertYote says:
February 4, 2013 at 4:33 pm
john robertson says:
February 4, 2013 at 11:43 am
@ Neil Jordan, I would pay cash, to see a enviro- get cuddly with a wolverine.
###
Like this?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Reminds me of the guy on TV who was caught tranking the animals he was handling for the camera when one of them died.
###
No. This is legit. He has raised the two wolverines he keeps since kits. There is plenty of footage of him and with them. They are definitely not tranked. Wolverines, when hand raised from kits by someone who knows what they are doing (i.e expert in mustelid behavior) can be quite playful, just like other members of the family. Not all of the video of wolverines fighting wolves, one finds on the internet, is of actual fighting so much as play. Just look to the set of the tail and ears of the wolf and you will see the difference. There is also plenty of video of wolverines playing with each other. Wolverines play rough. They’re wolverines, after all. Its our projections that want to turn every interaction into a fight.
Off-topic but relevant
I’ve just been reading a piece about Thor Heyerdahl, of ‘Kon-Tiki’ fame. Up until his famous expedition in 1947 the ‘scientific consensus’ was that the Polynesian Islands were discovered by explorers from Asia, as it was ‘not possible’ for South American Indians to cover that distance in the Pacific Ocean on balsa rafts. He had noticed that the wind and currents always hit Fatu Hiva (in French Polynesia) from the east. So he built his famous raft, and basically drifted from South America to Polynesia. Point proved.
So much for ‘scientific consensus’ – or as we now know it: ‘The science is settled’….
I know it’s only cheap satire and not science, but Unger could have saved himself a lot of time, money and heartache if he had just read my epic 12-part docu-fable “G.P. Bear Goes to Washington,” which started in WUWT on Christmas Day of 2009.
As Grandpa Polar Bear said to his brainwashed and terrified grandson before he rode his iceberg to DC to tell the federal government to leave his proud and resilient species alone:
“Boy,” he said firmly, “I’m going to tell you something I want you to remember for the rest of your life. We are polar bears. We are the largest land carnivores on Earth. We are the species ursus maritimus – ‘bears of the sea.’ We can swim 200 miles. We can walk 100 miles a day.
“We learned how to live on this frozen wasteland at the top of the world thousands of years before humans discovered fire. There are 25,000 of us alive today – twice as many as 50 years ago. We are not going to become extinct – no matter what Principal Hansen and her computers say. Now go to sleep – and no more silly nightmares.”
I’m still waiting for Hollywood/Pixar to turn my serial into a movie….
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/25/g-p-bear-goes-to-washington-the-true-story-of-a-freedom-loving-carnivore/
To the tune of “I saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus”
Original here:
http://www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/c/christmas_songs/i_saw_mommy_kissing_santa_claus.html
I saw Algore kiss an oil can
When I saw “His Rotunda” last night.
There was oil everywhere
In that sale to Al Jazzera
Guess anything is “Green” it seems if dollar signs are there.
Then, I saw Algore make the PR rounds
And pretend that he is still all snowy white.
Oh, what a laugh it would have been,
To hear what Hansen and Greenpeace screamed
When Al spoke for Big Oil last night!
It;s all spin now – the activists say that polar bears need to be put on the endangered list as they are DOWN to a mere 25,000……..The BBC reports this so it’s impoortant,