From the:USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station via Eurekalert
Polar bears no longer on ‘thin ice’: researchers say polar bears could face brighter future
VIDEO: Science team placing radio collars on polar bears.
PORTLAND, Ore. December 21, 2010. “When I first picked up the cub, she was biting my hand,” explains wildlife biologist Bruce Marcot. He was trying to calm the squirming cub while its sedated mother slept nearby.
In the snowy spring of 2009, Portland-based Marcot traveled with several colleagues onto the frozen Arctic Ocean north of Alaska to study and survey polar bear populations. From their base of operations at the settlements of Deadhorse, next to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, they ventured by small plane and helicopter over a wide area of the Beaufort Sea in a study to determine the bears’ health and to learn the impact of warming Arctic temperatures on their population.
“From the helicopter, we located radio-collared polar bears by their signals. Then, swooping in like a cowboy after a bull, our lead scientist would dart the bear with a tranquilizer dart,” explains Marcot. “We then landed, corralled any cubs, and made the sleeping mother comfortable on the sea ice while we studied her health, weighed her, took measurements, and changed her radio collar so she could be further tracked.”
Marcot, a scientist at the Forest Service’s Pacific Northwest Research Station, is a co-author on the recently published paper about the impact of climate change on polar bears, in the journal Nature. He was invited to be a member of the study team because of his expertise in the analysis and modeling of wildlife population viability. The study’s lead scientist, Steven Amstrup, of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Alaska Science Center, had asked Marcot several years earlier to join a polar bear science team organized to advise the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. That team examined and analyzed global polar bear populations, habitats, and climate change.
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IMAGE:They presented their results in 2007 before several federal agencies and the U.S. Department of the Interior, in Washington, D.C., and in 2008 the Federal government designated the polar bear as a globally threatened species.
The 2007 study projected that about two-thirds of the roughly 25,000 polar bears in the world would disappear by mid-century because of the effects of climate change and the ice melting in the Arctic. Now, in the December 2010 Nature study, Marcot and his colleagues learned that decline of the bear could be mitigated if greenhouse gas emissions are significantly reduced.
These findings may have implications for citizens and natural resource managers in the Pacific Northwest working to manage resources for a warming climate, particularly in high mountain areas.
For the past several years Marcot has collaborated with the U.S. Geological Survey’s Alaska Science Center, the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and others on studies examining the impacts of climate change on wildlife and the environment.
The most recent study published in Nature, “Greenhouse Gas Mitigation Can Reduce Sea-ice Loss and Increase Polar Bear Persistence,” was coauthored by Amstrup; Eric DeWeaver, National Science Foundation; David Douglas, U.S. Geological Survey, Alaska Science Center; Marcot; George Durner, U.S. Geological Survey; Cecilia Bitz, University of Washington; and David Bailey, National Center for Atmospheric Research, issue of Nature. It appears online at www http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v468/n7326/full/nature09653.html
The study’s key findings says Marcot are:
- The results of modeling regional polar bear populations indicate a potentially brighter future for the species if global greenhouse gas concentrations can be kept under control at levels less than those expected under current conditions.
- Sea ice habitat for polar bears will likely not face a “tipping point” of sudden catastrophic loss over the 21st century, particularly under a mitigation scenario to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions.
- Even under relatively stringent mitigation reductions in future greenhouse gas concentration, polar bears in two of the four eco-regions, constituting about 2/3 of all current polar bear numbers, will still incur at least reductions in numbers and distribution. However, the best future outcome for these populations would result from a combination of mitigation control of greenhouse gas concentration with best on-the-ground management practices to control hunting and human activities such as levels of shipping, oil and gas activities, etc.
- There will still be significant uncertainty as to the future of polar bear populations from the combination of all sources of stressors from climate change, direct human disruption, and other biological factors.
The team’s study is significant. “It demonstrates for the first time that—and how—a combination of greenhouse gas mitigation and control of adverse human activities in the Arctic can lead to a more promising future for polar bear populations and their sea ice habitat,” says Marcot. “It also provides specific predictions of the future, couched in terms of probabilities of polar bear population response that decision-makers could use in risk management.”
The PNW Research Station is headquartered in Portland, Oregon. It has 11 laboratories and centers located in Alaska, Oregon, and Washington and about 425 employees.
Hey – leave our penguins alone!
And this is what the mighty journal Nature has become. A cheerleader for AGW and given up any pretense of real science. What a pity.
If they really care about saving polar bears, why not relocate a couple dozen to Portland (to roam free of course)? I recon they’d thrive there.
H.R. says:
December 21, 2010 at 7:05 pm
Not really. The polar bears line up to get shot. They’re in it for the cheap high ;o)
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“oh man…. I got so wasted from that dart the other day! What a buzz!”
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Do the scientists have to test the tranquilizer beforehand? ………
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yr0_iCohyhw&fs=1&hl=en_US]
“Also, since there are three times more polar bears now than 50 years ago, and CO2 is the identified culprit according to these “experts”, then CO2 must be already mitigated, no? Just trying to follow their logic trail…”
In 50 years the polar bear population has trebled.
In the last 50 years, the partial pressure of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased markedly.
Therefore, an increased level of atmospheric CO2 benefits the polar bear population.
That’s logical.
“The study’s key findings says Marcot are:
■The results of modeling regional polar bear populations indicate a potentially brighter future for the species if global greenhouse gas concentrations can be kept under control at levels less than those expected under current conditions.
■Sea ice habitat for polar bears will likely not face a “tipping point” of sudden catastrophic loss over the 21st century, particularly under a mitigation scenario to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions.
etc. etc. ad nauseam.
So can these “scientists” explain how bear populations have been saved because of a “mitigation scenario”?
How much CO2 has NOT been emitted because of all the Kyoto nonsense?
Answer: Very little indeed. China, India and other countries continue to pump it out (and if it helps their economies, good for them!) CO2 levels continue to increase. So how are the bears reacting to changes to CO2 levels that are only predicted?
Just asking…..
Okay, lemme get this straight. They flew around in a helicopter, tranquilized, weighed and collared a few bears, and somehow, from that, scientifically established that reducing CO2 emissions will lower temperatures and save their icy habitat from otherwise certain destruction.
So, 2 + 2 = 95
Speaking of hysterical polar bear stories, these were fun while they lasted.
The Myth of the Drowning Polar Bears Due to The Warming is based on 4 dead bears in 2004… and…
“there were reports of drowning polar bears in 2007, and they were directly attributable to human activities. But they didn’t drown because of global warming, instead, they drowned because they had first been shot with tranquilizer darts and then slipped into the sea and were unable to be recovered.”
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2008/05/16/where-are-all-the-drowning-polar-bears
Not that polar bears drowning is anything new.
The Myth of the Starving Cannibal Polar Bears is also based on 2004 incidents – possibly all related to one predatory bear – and is not new behaviour in any case.
alaska.usgs.gov/science/biology/polarbears/unusualmortality.html
A recent article showed clear evidence that the vast majority of those who gained promotion could be classified as being elevated to the level of the own incompetence and a more practical and positive solution would be just to put all of the names in a hat and make a random selection, at the very least you would get a worse result.
I have always been of the opinion that education was an indulgence wasted on the many with dire results for the majority who suffered from the consequences of infantile stupidity and there is no better subject to supply my theory than “climate science” and its related indisciplines, naive, muddle headed, morons supported by gullible politicians who crave electoral success more than life itself hence USA paying $75 billion in grants to these psychotic meglomaniacs. I suppose there is an inverse logic here as there are now 25000 polar bears it does stand to reason that if planet earth does spin off its axis then more polar bears will die, better that the Canadian government allows them to be hunted to extinction then the warmists can blame it on Co2 and save the blushes of the Canadian politicians, you really do have to think about the wider implications.
Why is it that the most muddle headed dimwits get the best paid jobs or the biggest research grants, surely we should have worked this particular stupidity through by now?
David Wells
Sounds like an easy paper to rebut – it seems to be making plenty of unjustifiable assumptions. Anyone up for it?
I think it is reasonable that if noone tries to knock it down, then it is accepted as valid research. Of course, if any formal criticism were to be suppressed, that would be a matter of interest.
There is ONE action that can help the polar bears right away. Ban hunting. I know some of you are hunting enthusiastes but I would rather ban hunting than have to endure draconian measures worldwid in order to reduce c02 – which won’t make the blindest bit of difference to Arctic sea ice. Note: about 1,000 polar bears a killed in hunting each year. That is 5,000 bears in 5 years from the mean population of 25,000 bears.
Typo:
Note: about 1,000 polar bears a[re] killed in hunting each year.
Now that even the ‘hockey team’ has had to admit to the existence of the medieval warm period and the Roman warm period and it is more widely known that there have been warmer times in the recent past, and the fact that most of this current inter-glacial has been warmer than today, how did the polar bear population survive these longer warmer times in the past?
There are no such things as Polar bears!
They all passed away in the medieval warm period, remember?
The only scientific conclusion a sane person could make here is that polar bear shit is more powerfull than bullshit, what a transparent crock of lies.
Jeremy:
Polar bears have no natural fear of humans. The most dangerous bears are the juveniles who have never seen humans.
“… hungry polar bears are extremely unpredictable and are known to kill and sometimes eat humans.[55] Polar bears are stealth hunters, and the victim is often unaware of the bear’s presence until the attack is underway.[63] Whereas brown bears often maul a person and then leave, polar bear attacks are more likely to be predatory and are almost always fatal.[63] However, due to the very small human population around the Arctic, such attacks are rare.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polar_bear
mike g says:
December 21, 2010 at 7:24 pm
@John from CA
Trouble swimming with the collar? Surely they can’t swim at all. Haven’t you see the pictures of them clinging to the melting ice about to drown only a few feet from shore?
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I’ve seen all sorts of photoshop myths but the fact that we’re paying this loon to fly around the Arctic harassing Polar Bears and then fly his frost bitten brain to Washington for a hearing is beyond belief.
The UK has cut Science funding by 40%. I think we can do better than that.
Polar bears might actually do better with no sea ice; concentrating their prey on the coastal shores.
Furthermore, the article has no science. All wanderlust speculation. Not worth the paper it is written on.
I think we need to eliminate the polar bears in order to save the baby Walruses. Polar Bears are obvioulsy Darwin’s Evil Capitalists preying exclusively one the weak and helpless.
Charles Higley says,
They are so numerous that they are invading human settlements and endangering the children.
——————-
Logical fallacy.
It does not follow that since they are invading human settlements
THEREFORE
They must be numerous
LazyTeenager says: December 22, 2010 at 8:15 am
Well, it is estimated that the population has increased five-fold in the last 30 years.
Or is that also a logical fallacy in your religion?
The authors are just setting the stage for future layers of BS. In a few years they will claim that their climate change mitigation efforts have born fruit and saved the polar bear from extinction. Then they will point to rising polar bear numbers as proof.
This is an old and well developed practice, how many people actually believe that the DDT ban saved the eagles? The fact that all or the bird counts showed eagle populations rebounding starting 23 years before the ban and in fact increasing at their maximum rate during the years of peak usage is lost in the din of Baloney from National Geographic and others.
Soon we will see stories of falling skin cancer death rates because of the CFC ban. Just because the claim is total rubbish will not slow them for a minute.
Conservation biology is an offshoot of evolutionary biology. Both disciplines use the same approach in their activities. “Make it up as you go along” is their motto.
“The study’s key findings says Marcot are:
The results of modeling regional polar bear populations indicate a potentially brighter future for the species if global greenhouse gas concentrations can be kept under control at levels less than those expected under current conditions. ….”
So, since none of these guys and gals are atmospheric scientists or physicists, just how does their research prove controlling GHG levels will have an impact? These are just follow-on researchers assuming the atmospheric scientists and physicists are correct. No proofs here, move along, move along.
“….Sea ice habitat for polar bears will likely not face a “tipping point” of sudden catastrophic loss over the 21st century, particularly under a mitigation scenario to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions. ….”
Again, no proofs here. Again, move along, move along.
“….Even under relatively stringent mitigation reductions in future greenhouse gas concentration, polar bears in two of the four eco-regions, constituting about 2/3 of all current polar bear numbers, will still incur at least reductions in numbers and distribution. However, the best future outcome for these populations would result from a combination of mitigation control of greenhouse gas concentration with best on-the-ground management practices to control hunting and human activities such as levels of shipping, oil and gas activities, etc. ….”
Yada, yada, yada. It is always man and big oil’s fault, even if GHGs are controlled. I think that even a freshman college student could see that hunting regulations have impacts. The rest was not proven.
“….There will still be significant uncertainty as to the future of polar bear populations from the combination of all sources of stressors from climate change, direct human disruption, and other biological factors…..”
This is the last and all important, “We need and deserve more funding please” statement that follows all research that has nothing to do about global warming, just the ‘what if’ junk.
This makes me sick.
Why are they continuing to violate the poor polar bears?
I remember a couple of years back I read about the world wild hippie fund spending several million dollars on helicopter rent and fuel to stress down the poor cuddly creature with them big eyes to count them. Not mark ’em mind you, just count them from the air, incredibly noisily as always, spewing out all that horribly deadly carbon dioxide.
And, apparently, botching it completely since they only could count to a probable 10% or some low such, the rest they had to model forth in such an insanely difficult extrapolation algorithm that they ended up with the same 20-25 thousand polar bears that year too, same as the other 15 years too. Must’ve been a magic moment for the helicopter pilot though.