Press release from the GWPF:
“The main story of new study is the remarkable recovery of Arctic polar bear population”
Earlier this week, the Guardian newspaper ran a headline claiming that the ‘polar bear population in frozen sea north of Alaska falls 40% in 10 years’ – a claim repeated today by the AFP news agency.
Dr Susan Crockford, a Canadian zoologist and professor with more than 35 years experience, has been highly critical of these stories, claiming that they are misleading the public.
A study by US Geological Survey researchers and scientists did find that polar bear survival rates were particularly low from 2004 to 2006. However, the study also found that polar bear populations in the area had largely recovered by 2010.
Indeed, the US Fish & Wildlife Service reported earlier this year that “the number of polar bears observed in 2012 was high relative to similar surveys conducted over the past decade.”
Furthermore, some newspaper columns attributed the low survival rates in 2004- 2006 to thinning ice despite an acknowledgement by the authors that the population decline happened in thick spring ice conditions. In fact, the recovery in polar bear numbers from 2007 onwards occurred when summer sea ice was remarkably low, according to Dr Crockford.
Responding to the claims in the media, Dr Crockford said:
“The main story of this study is the remarkable recovery of the polar bear population by 2010 which has likely continued since then. To suggest that polar bear populations have been declining is hugely misleading.
“The authors have also acknowledged that the cause of the 2004-2006 decline was heavy spring ice conditions. They found no correlation for the decline with summer sea ice conditions.”
???
18 Nov: UK Independent: Lewis Smith:Years of marine research sunk – because seals ate the evidence
In fact, the quick-learning seals have become so adept at picking up the signals, and realising they meant food was around, that academics fear their attempts to study the movement and behaviour of the tagged fish could have been skewed to a “profound” extent, ruining their findings…
Acoustic tags are increasingly being used by researchers to monitor shark populations. But there is a risk, at least for the smaller species and the young fish, of the subjects becoming “more detectable by prey species such as seals”, said Amanda Stansbury, of the University of St Andrews. She added that experiments in conjunction with the University of Cumbria had provided “concrete evidence” of the so-called dinner-bell effect…
“Research agencies worldwide invest significant resources in acoustic tagging studies to assess fish stocks and determine survival rates.
“As acoustic tags could make a fish more vulnerable to predation, tagging can lead to erroneous conclusions in such studies.”..
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/years-of-marine-research-sunk–because-seals-ate-the-evidence-9868995.html
Good news on the polar bear front … just keep them bears up there in the far north of Canada … we’ve got our hands full here in Buffalo …
http://d2ioe7v385j9xr.cloudfront.net/484_0b4b225f-ae2a-4932-b48e-03350424696a/64db9a40-2a92-449b-b8e3-6098a0dda149.jpg
http://d2ioe7v385j9xr.cloudfront.net/484_0b4b225f-ae2a-4932-b48e-03350424696a/c50d23e2-03d7-423a-b77b-d085add23893.jpg
Seeing what some of my neighbors got makes me feel good about the two feet I got … first time I can think of getting “only” two feet of snow as being lucky.
This is what 2 feet of snow really looks like –
http://tinyurl.com/lyqpvnr
LOL! Well done.
Love the doggie photo. Sent it to my kids and grandkids, who had been hearing about the snow in Buffalo.
/Mr Lynn
Here’s one from your neighbors:
http://youtu.be/dhuAmaYhnwQ
You gotta love it! At least the video, not the snow.
One of our Canadian national TV networks also gave half the story. They said the populations declined but conveniently failed to note that they had recovered after 2007.
I notice there aren’t any screaming headlines in the major US media outlets. Probably bad form to try to sell global warming when so many people are digging out from record snow or freezing in unusual cold….
“claiming that they are misleading the public” That’s what Alarmists do.
…another example of Keep It Simple And Sufficiently Scary (KISASS)
I’m finding that news, accuracy, and truth don’t seem to go together today. I do miss the days of the 1960s and 1970s reporting when reporters tried to tell both sides of a story and tried to be honest.
What is a reasonable estimate of the polar bear population these days? Is it still around 25,000? I’ve seen estimates from Norway (albeit somewhat dated, say to the 90s) of 42,000. Anyone have a number or a range?
Tor,
The PBSG still says 20,000-25,000 with a few “caveats” – i.e., they have finally admitted out loud that this number leaves out a large portion of the Arctic where polar bears have not yet been counted. Here is my latest discussion on that issue:
http://polarbearscience.com/2014/08/05/dodgy-new-clarification-of-global-polar-bear-population-estimate-yes-another/
Susan Crockford, PolarBearScience
Thin ice, seals can break through to be able to breathe. Polar bears can track seals and wait at holes, then eat them. Bears do well.
Ice thick, seals have difficulty in breaking through, prefer to breathe, so move away – polar bears cannot get to them, so get less food, or have to subsist on unwary scientists looking for bears or seals. Unwary scientists are all eaten Bears do not do well. sarc.
Well, who could argue that if the scientist never returns with a count that that count isn’t zero?
I can’t recall the show, (Smithsonian? Discovery?), examining mother polar bears with their cubs emerging from their dens in the spring and describing that the mother’s fat reserves right then are critically low because the cubs have been nursing for several weeks in the den. The mother has to leave the den and head for the ocean to find food.
The colder the conditions, the thicker the ice, the WORSE her situation becomes. Not only does she have further to go – her cubs have to make it as well. All the while they have to keep nursing thus depleting her fat reserves even faster on top of the energy she herself expends to make the trip.
Who in their right mind concludes that more ice is better for their survival? Just as you imply, FOOD is the important factor and it is in the WATER – not on the ice. All ice = no food = dead polar bears.
I have seen three instances recently where researchers have been responsible for the decline animal populations. Two different incidents involving king penguins where tracking tags have caused deaths due to exposure and predation and where rare frogs that have been made extinct due to a lethal fungus spread by researchers. It would be interesting to know whether researchers have caused some of the previous decline in the polar bear population?
Yes, I have always thought that shooting tranquilizers into wild animals and then manhandling them to attach electronic tags, plus having that unnatural device permanently affixed to one’s body (like teenagers with cell phones) would have to skew the data somewhat. Who knows what part it all plays in an animal’s ability to hunt game or avoid predators? Unlike CO2, it just ain’t natural!
Hey – it is the NEW ZEALAND Herald. Not too much institutional knowledge about Polar Bears there, or indeed bears of any kind (other than teddy). Their coverage of penguins on the other hand is probably excellent. I bet they cover penguins like seals.
“In conclusion and moving back to conversations with young people, I always agree with them in the end that the Polar bear situation is terrible but what I’m really thinking is terrible, is just how successful propaganda can be.”
http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2011/09/15/polar-bears-going-extinct-yawn/
Pointman
Polar bears are special.
In fairness to the Polar Bear Community I demand that Coca-Cola stop using their image to advertise Coke products.
The Canadian Broadcast Corporation (CBC) did a very fair news story on this issue interviewing people who work with polar bears claiming they are surviving very well. To see it click here:
http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/TV+Shows/The+National/Environment/ID/2505129180/
or google Polar Bears, CBC
Thank you! I enjoyed it.
Someone who has not read on the Arctic and polar bears would be mislead by this.
They go onto mention polar bear numbers in the southern Beaufort Sea. The headline is misleading and wrong as is the first sentence.
“Chip Javert
November 19, 2014 at 12:55 pm
A least in the USA (I know; does not apply to the Guardian), “news” is a constitutionally protected activity, with the implied obligation of accuracy & fairness“
(Bold mine).
Uh, evidentially the majority of the US Main Stream Media has not gotten that memo.
/cynic
And the 97% consensus: http://freebeacon.com/issues/scientists-split-on-human-impact-on-climate-change/
And the children that won´t know what snow is: http://www.usatoday.com/story/weather/2014/11/19/wednesday-weather/19261905/
And…. well, you name it and I am sure they´ve lied about it.
GWPF does well to expose the chthonic editors who aid in the gross exaggeration at the Guardian.
It seems that the polar bear icon, chosen by PR teams for the crusade for the climate change cause, was a strategic mistake. Their cause is in need of intelligence on the PR teams.
John
Only a nitwit would think polar bear, or any top predator population, remains constant. Even high school biology teaches the cyclic nature of predator – prey systems.
To suggest that polar bear populations have been declining is hugely misleading.
No no no! It is not hugely misleading. It is a blatant and purposeful lie. It is put out there purely for climate change propaganda purposes.
Dog bites man = not news
Man bites dog = news
Start with your ideology and your conclusion, then shape the story accordingly. Voila, journalism 2014.