Monthly Archives: May 2021

Activist heads explode as USFWS says oil activities pose minimal risk to polar bears in AK

Posted on May 30, 2021 | Comments Off

Apparently, the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) under Joe Biden agrees with my conclusion that oil company activities in Alaska pose minimal risk to polar bears (Crockford 2019, 2020, 2021). Although this ruling is not yet final, they have proposed that oil exploration and extraction activities on the North Slope of Alaska can proceed over the next five years.

After noting that no major offshore oil spills have ever taken place in the Alaskan portion of the Beaufort Sea (see map below) and that all spills to date have been on land with no impact on polar bears, the proposed rule in the 200+ page assessment states:

Continue reading →

Comments Off on Activist heads explode as USFWS says oil activities pose minimal risk to polar bears in AK

Posted in Advocacy, Conservation Status

Tagged Alaska, Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Center for Biological Diversity, disturbance, oil exploration, polar bear, proposed ruling, USFWS, walrus, Willow project

Surprising sea ice thickness across the Arctic is good news for polar bears

Posted on May 27, 2021 | Comments Off

This year near the end of May the distribution of thickest sea ice (3.5-5m/11.5-16.4 ft – or more) is a bit surprising, given that the WMO has suggested we may be only five years away from a “dangerous tipping point” in global temperatures. There is the usual and expected band of thick ice in the Arctic Ocean across northern Greenland and Canada’s most northern islands but there are also some patches in the peripheral seas (especially north of Svalbard, southeast Greenland, Foxe Basin, Hudson Strait, Chukchi Sea, Laptev Sea). This is plenty of sea ice for polar bear hunting at this time of year (mating season is pretty much over) and that thick ice will provide summer habitat for bears that choose to stay on the ice during the low-ice season: not even close to an emergency for polar bears.

Continue reading →

Comments Off on Surprising sea ice thickness across the Arctic is good news for polar bears

Posted in Conservation Status, Life History, Sea ice habitat

Tagged Arctic, climate change, ice thickness, polar bear, sea ice, tipping point, WMO

Spring polynyas in the Arctic then and now as feeding areas for hungry polar bears

Posted on May 23, 2021 | Comments Off

Patches of open water in the Arctic that develop in the spring, including polynyas and widening shore leads, are largely due to the actions of wind and currents on mobile pack ice rather than ice melt. Contrary to concerns expressed about possible negative implications of these early patches of open water, these areas have always been critical congregation areas for Arctic seals and are therefore important feeding areas for polar bears in late spring.

Continue reading →

Comments Off on Spring polynyas in the Arctic then and now as feeding areas for hungry polar bears

Posted in Life History, Sea ice habitat

Tagged flaw lead, hunting, open water, polar bear, polynya, sea ice, seals, shore lead, spring

Wandering polar bears are the new starving polar bears, falsely blamed on climate change

Posted on May 15, 2021 | Comments Off

Back in 2017, we famously had National Geographic falsely blaming a starving polar bear on climate change but since then we have been inundated (relatively speaking) with stories of ‘wandering’ bears sighted far from Arctic coastlines. These wandering bears are oddities to be sure but are not in any way an indicator of melting Arctic sea ice or lost habitat, as The Times (UK) has claimed in this latest example (Polar bear treks 1,500 miles south as Arctic hunting zone melts away).

Similar to three other recent examples, from 2019 – in Alaska in winter, in Chukotka in early spring, and Siberia in late spring – this month’s example cannot rationally be blamed on lack of sea ice. This year’s bear took at least eight weeks to travel from the Lena River Delta area of the Laptev Sea to a small village in Yakusk, Russia where it was captured on 11 May, shown below on the map of the route it took included in the story at The Daily Mail (11 May).

Continue reading →

Comments Off on Wandering polar bears are the new starving polar bears, falsely blamed on climate change

Posted in Polar bear attacks, Sea ice habitat

Tagged climate change, competition, inland, melting ice, polar bear, sea ice, Siberia, sighting, young bears

How are polar bears doing 15 years after the IUCN declared them ‘vulnerable’ to extinction?

Posted on May 10, 2021 | Comments Off

The beginning of this month was the 15th anniversary of the day the IUCN declared polar bears ‘vulnerable’ to extinction because of climate change, the first time such a designation had ever been made. It was based on the opinion of polar bear specialists who examined the vague information available at the time and decided that in 45 years the bears might be in serious trouble. This decision changed the way the IUCN assessed species risk and led to mass confusion for the general public, who falsely assumed polar bear numbers had already declined by a huge amount.

Continue reading →

Comments Off on How are polar bears doing 15 years after the IUCN declared them ‘vulnerable’ to extinction?

Posted in Conservation Status, Population, Sea ice habitat

Tagged anniversary, extinction, IUCN, PBSG, polar bear, population size, status, threatened, thriving, vulnerable

A fabulous new book in the works

Posted on May 6, 2021 | Comments Off

Blogging has been slow in part because I’m working on a new book that I’m really excited about. At this point, I can say that it features one of the species pictured below. But which will it be: science or fiction?