GOP Denies Global Warming as Polar Bear Cubs Die in Melting Arctic Ice
Geoff York is a polar bear biologist working for the World Wildlife Fund’s Arctic Program. He has reported that polar bear cubs are being forced to swim longer distances due to their melting habitat in the Arctic, and the cubs are dying ultimately because of global warming effects.
York said, according to Reuters, “Climate change is pulling the sea ice out from under polar bears’ feet, forcing some to swim longer distances to find food and habitat.”
In the study York co-authored, they found that polar bear cubs who had to swim long distances due to lack of ice experienced a 45 percent mortality rate; cubs who did not had only an 18 percent mortality rate.
While physical evidence is obvious, instead of making an effort to do something about the detrimental effects that are occurring in our environment on earth, Republicans are denying it in even larger numbers. According to The Associated Press, in 2008, 50 percent of conservatives said they believed in the effects of global warming. But, in order to pander to the far right, many have changed their position on the issue. This year only 30 percent of conservatives say global warming has an effect on our world.
The bears can’t find any ice!
Jeez, when are these buffoons going to give up on the poley bear meme? The ice loss witnessed over the past 20 years hasn’t effected the total population of the polar bear. More, the idiocy claiming polar bears can’t exist without arctic ice is sophomoric at best! They are grizzly bears adapted to the arctic environment. They can’t adapt back? Lunatics! They already thrive on land!
More inconvenient truths. There is more ice in the Arctic now than the average of the last 9000 years. Apparently in previous warm spells, polar bear cubs would hitch rides with eskimos to commute to their bergs and back again.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43798896/ns/us_news-environment/
“To gather data, researchers used satellites and tracked 68 polar bear females equipped with GPS collars over six years, from 2004 through 2009, to find occasions when these bears swam more than 30 miles at a time.”
(And no doubt chased them with helicopters )
http://msnbcmedia2.msn.com/j/MSNBC/Components/Photo/_new/110718_polarbear-swim.grid-6×2.jpg
I am pretty sure that whatever they did to these bears had an influence on the number of cubs lost (and not for the better) .Look at that poor bear obviously alarmed at the Helicopter wash.
I think they are saying this
“Climate change is pulling the sea ice out from under polar bears’ feet, forcing some to swim longer distances to find food and habitat.”
Which does make sense, ie they swim further and then get tired so can’t hunt as fast on land so don’t catch as much?
Having said that surely the total seal population goes up as a result !!!
Having said that then the fish stocks go down…..
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
It’s always tricky balancing biomass up there! As long as the Eskimo have McDonalds I am fine
Andy
Hmmm. From jimash’s msnbc link:
“To gather data, researchers used satellites and tracked 68 polar bear females equipped with GPS collars over six years, from 2004 through 2009, to find occasions when these bears swam more than 30 miles at a time.
There were 50 long-distance swims over those six years, involving 20 polar bears, ranging in distance up to 426 miles and in duration up to 12.7 days…”
So… only 20 (29%) of the 68 bears made these “long-distance” swims.
How does that compare with the past? NOBODY knows.
“At the time the collars were put on, 11 of the polar bears that swam long distances had young cubs; five of those polar bear mothers lost their cubs during the swim, representing a 45 percent mortality rate, the study found.”
So… only 11 (16%) of 68 female bears lost cubs in long swims. Yet that supposedly equals a 45% mortality rate – if you like cherry picking and ultra-dumbed down stats.
And WHY does this just include those with cubs “At the time the collars were put on”? Since those families would have been more stressed by the collaring experience, that could have impacts. What about the bears that had cubs later, and then made long swims? If there weren’t any, what would that tell us about the potential impact of this harassment?
On the bright side, most of these stressed long swimmers did NOT lose their cubs
And as they note a 426 mile swim, why didn’t they get more specific on the details of which ones lost cubs? Where did the 30 mile criteria come from?
Now, why the long swims? The answer to that question probably has at least as much to do with inter-bear competition as with melting ice.
Anyhow, will need to read this paper to see the details. Bear biologists are, for the most part, about the slipperiest of all the Conservation Biology liars because bears provide maximum political leverage. Until the polar bear became the AGW poster child, the grizzly bear was the most lied about species in the whole eco-crisis propaganda campaign.
The greatest increase in in the polar bear population came after restricting hunting and hunting is still the primary factor in keeping the numbers in check.