After being locked out last year, fieldwork monitoring polar bears in the Svalbard region of the Barents Sea resumed this spring. The results show that despite having to deal with the most extreme loss of summer sea ice in the entire Arctic, polar bears in this region continue to thrive. These facts show no hint of that impending catastrophic decline in population size we keep hearing is just around the corner. No tipping point here.
Comments Off on Barents Sea polar bears thriving despite huge summer ice loss: spring research results are in
Posted in Conservation Status, Population, Sea ice habitat
Tagged Barents Sea, body condition, cub production, facts, field research, litter size, models, polar bear, sea ice, Svalbard
In an astonishing display of under-selling good news, the authors of a new paper announcing that Kane Basin polar bears are doing well have avoided mentioning that the population increased substantially since the 1990s and insist that any benefits will be short-lived.
Kane Basin population size at 2013 was 357 (range 221 – 493), up from 224 (range 145 – 303) in 1997. That’s an increase of 59% based on a 2016 recalculation of the 1997 population estimate of 164 (Crockford 2020) – it would have been a 118% increase otherwise.
Money quote: “We find that a small number of the world’s polar bears that live in multiyear ice regions are temporarily benefiting from climate change.” Kristen Laidre, lead author of Transient benefits of climate change for a high‐Arctic polar bear (Ursus maritimus) subpopulation
Both the paper and the press release also claim, despite acknowledging that there is no evidence for this conclusion (“the duration of these benefits is unknown“), that this good news will probably not last because computer models say beneficial conditions might not persist beyond the end of the century.
As always, if you’d like to see this paper, use the ‘contact me’ page to request a copy (it’s paywalled).
UPDATE 25 September 2020: News just out from Nunavut this morning, “New Nunavut polar bear surveys point to “currently healthy” populations in M’Clintock Channel and Boothia Bay.” The survey report for M’Clintock Channel (mentioned in the post below) and neighbouring Gulf of Bothia has still not been made public but this announcement suggests that population numbers in these subpopulations have also increased by some amount that will be similarly discounted as unimportant.
Comments Off on Polar bear researchers try very hard to make good news in Kane Basin sound trivial
Posted in Conservation Status, Population, Sea ice habitat
Tagged annual ice, Kane Basin, Last Ice Area, M'Clintock Channel, models, more bears, multiyear ice, polar bear, productivity, sea ice
Comments Off on Why the Covid-19 epidemic is essentially over & current PCR testing protocols are pointless
Posted in academic freedom, science
Tagged covid-19, epidemic, evidence, models, observations, PCR, second wave
This essay about medical researchers having trouble getting their papers published because the results don’t support the official pandemic narrative has disturbing parallels with my experience trying to inject some balance into the official polar bear conservation narrative.1 Especially poignant is the mention of models built on assumptions sold as ‘facts’ that fail once data (i.e. evidence) become available – which of course is the entire point of my latest book, The Polar Bear Catastrophe That Never Happened.
Read the commentary below, copied from Lockdownsceptics.org (6 September 2020). Bold in original, link added to the story to which this is a response, and brief notes and links added as footnotes for parallels with polar bear conservation science. Continue reading
Comments Off on Sceptical covid-19 research and sceptical polar bear science: is there a difference?
Posted in academic freedom, Conservation Status, science
Tagged academic freedom, assumptions, covid-19, evidence, facts, freedom of speech, lockdowns, models, observations, orthidoxy, polar bear, sceptical science
In something resembling a new pattern for Western Hudson Bay polar bears, most of the animals are still out on the ice in late July this year, just like they were in the 1980s. The same thing happened last year but was brushed off as a happy anomaly. However, after last fall’s 1980s-like early freeze-up, this makes the sixth year in a row of good to very good sea ice conditions for Western Hudson Bay polar bears. No wonder polar bear experts haven’t published these data: good sea ice conditions along with polar bears coming ashore fat and healthy are not just inconvenient – they threaten to destroy the extinction panic narrative that depends on Western Hudson Bay bears showing evidence of harm from reduced sea ice.
Fat mother and cub onshore at Wakusp National Park, Western Hudson Bay 18 July 2020, one of the first of the season.
Comments Off on Six good years in a row for the polar bear subpopulation used to predict species demise
Posted in Advocacy, Life History, Sea ice habitat
Tagged breakup, catastrophe, extinction, good years, Hudson Bay, models, polar bears, prediction, proxy, sea ice, trends, western hudson bay
On this first anniversary of the publication of The Polar Bear Catastrophe That Never Happened, it’s a day of celebration for me. The book has informed thousands about how and why the scary stories about the imminent demise of polar bears due to human-caused global warming failed so miserably. It is a story of the triumph of facts over assumptions and a perfect example of why scientific observations trump model predictions. It is also a study of science at its worst: how a close-knit community of scientists groomed by a few senior researchers was able to cast out an insider who refused to tow the line on their climate change agenda – and mobilized mobs to attack outsiders who questioned their authority.
If you haven’t read it, now may be the perfect time. Many of you will be forced or encouraged to stay at home because of Covid-19 concerns, so here is one way to put the time to good use. Ebooks are perfect for this situation. If you don’t like Amazon, Smashwords has an ebook version here.
Smashwords also has an ebook version of my novel, EATEN. This polar bear attack thriller is a timely read for a number of reasons but primarily because it’s the story of an animal epidemic with horrific consequences quite different from the one we are facing at the moment.
My polar bear science book for kids, Polar Bear Facts and Myths in ebook form might be the perfect diversion for kids at home who need interesting educational material.
You’ll find links to all of my books, in all countries and all outlets, at my personal website here.
Stay safe.
Comments Off on First anniversary for The Polar Bear Catastrophe That Never Happened
Posted in Advocacy, Conservation Status, Life History, Polar bear attacks, Population, Summary
Tagged catastrophe, ebooks, epidemic, extinction, models, polar bear, population, predictions, science, sea ice, thriller, winter
On sale at Amazon today, my new full-length science book, The Polar Bear Catastrophe That Never Happened, published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation.
Paperback and ebook versions are available. See the GWPF press release here.
The official book launch is 10 April in Calgary, details below.
The Polar Bear Catastrophe That Never Happened explains why the catastrophic decline in polar bear numbers we were promised in 2007 failed to materialize. It’s the layman’s story of how and why the polar bear came to be considered `Threatened’ with extinction and tracks the species rise and fall as an icon of the global warming movement. The book also tells the story of my role in bringing that failure to public attention – and the backlash against me that ensued.
For the first time, you’ll see a frank and detailed account of attempts by scientists to conceal population growth as numbers rose from an historical low in the 1960s to the astonishing highs that surely must exist after almost 50 years of protection from overhunting. There is also a discussion of what thriving populations of bears mean for the millions of people who live and work in areas of the Arctic inhabited by polar bears.
Title: The Polar Bear Catastrophe That Never Happened
Author: Susan J. Crockford
Publisher: Global Warming Policy Foundation
Publication date: 17 March 2019
Distrbutor: Amazon
Formats: Papberback and Ebook
Number of pages: 209
Order it here.
Continue reading
Comments Off on The Polar Bear Catastrophe That Never Happened is now for sale
Posted in Book review, Polar bear attacks, Population, Sea ice habitat, Summary
Tagged attacks, extinction, facts, models, number of bears, polar bear, population size, predictions, science, sea ice, threatened
Contrary to what the misleading press release implies, an entirely speculative new paper by polar bear specialists Kristin Laidre and Ian Stirling (among others) presents zero evidence that polar bear consumed whale carcasses during the last warm Interglacial (Eemian, ca. 115-130kya). And contrary to the impression that Eemian conditions were very challenging for polar bears, simulations from the single paleo sea ice simulation paper these authors cite show the ice-free season over most of the Eemian was less severe than today in the polar basin, with no reason for polar bears to scavenge extensively on large whale carcasses.
Polar bears are shown scavenging on the carcass of a dead bowhead whale that washed ashore on Wrangel Island, Russia. Credit: Chris Collins/Heritage Expeditions
This is yet another paper posing as science co-authored by Stirling that uses anecdotal accounts of behaviour to send a message about evolutionary capabilities of polar bears (Stirling and van Meurs 2015). With little or nothing to back it up, the paper’s real purpose is to convey Stirling’s opinion that past polar bear survival is irrelevant to understanding future polar bear survival — and that all the bears are gonna die unless we do something about carbon dioxide emissions generated by fossil fuel use.
Is it a coincidence that the Summary for Policy Makers was issued by the IPCC over the weekend (not the report with the science in it but the document that all politicians agreed were acceptable)? Look no further than the last sentence of National Geographic’s article on this story, which includes a quote from lead author Laidre and a link to the magazine’s interpretation of the new IPCC report:
“Laidre put it even more bluntly: “If you want polar bears around we need sea ice, and loss of sea ice closely tied to our activities and our fossil fuel emissions.” (Learn about the IPCC’s dire new climate report.)”
Comments Off on New paper provides no evidence that polar bears ate whale carcasses to survive Eemian interglacial
Posted in Advocacy, History, Life History, Sea ice habitat
Tagged anecdotal observations, carcasses, dead whales, Eemian, interglacial, models, polar bear, sea ice, whales
Until now, my scientific paper post at PeerJ Preprints for review, about the failure of Steve Amstrup’s 2007 USGS polar bear survival model (Crockford 2017), has been formally ignored by Amstrup and his colleagues. But now Amstrup and his colleagues have taken to lying to the media about my analysis because he can’t refute it in a scholarly manner.
Amstrup was quoted by Erica Goode in her New York Times article on the Harvey et al. (2018) BioScience attack paper published Tuesday (10 April 2018: “Climate Change Denialists Say Polar Bears Are Fine. Scientists Are Pushing Back”):
“Dr. Amstrup, however, said that according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, the average September sea ice extent for the years 2007 to 2017 was 4.5 million square kilometers, “nowhere near the low levels projected it would be by the middle of the century.”
“To say that we already should have seen those declines now when we’re not early [sic] to the middle of the century yet is absurd,” he said.” [my bold]
And over at the online outlet Mashable (11 April 2018: “Climate scientists fight false polar bear narrative pushed by bloggers”), reporter Mark Kaufman quoted Jeff Harvey, lead author of the BioScience paper on the issue, although Harvey is hardly an authority:
“(Harvey noted Crockford misunderstood and then mischaracterized this prediction).”
Amstrup also presented a lame critique of the portion of my Financial Post 27 February 2018 op-ed that dealt with his 2007 predictions, published 2 March 2018 by Climate Feedback (self-proclaimed “fact checkers”), that is easily refuted because it’s a blatant lie. He’s saying 2015 sea ice models are relevant to his 2007 predictions that used 2005/2006 sea ice models.
Comments Off on Steve Amstrup is lying to the media about my critique of his 2007 model
Posted in Advocacy, Conservation Status, Population, Scientists hit back, Sea ice habitat
Tagged Amstrup, BioScience, bloggers, Climate Feedback, Harvey, models, New York Times, polar bear, predictions, sea ice
One powerful polar bear fact is slowly rising above the message of looming catastrophe repeated endlessly by the media: More than 15,000 polar bears have not disappeared since 2005. Although the extent of the summer sea ice after 2006 dropped abruptly to levels not expected until 2050, the predicted 67-per-cent decline in polar bear numbers simply didn’t happen. Rather, global polar bear numbers have been stable or slightly improved.
The polar bear’s resilience should have meant the end of its use as a cherished icon of global warming doom, but it didn’t. The alarmism is not going away without a struggle. Continue reading
Comments Off on My Financial Post op-ed: Polar bears keep thriving even as global warming alarmists keep pretending they’re dying
Posted in Conservation Status, Population, Sea ice habitat
Tagged bearded seals, climate change, decline, fail, global warming, icon, inconsistencies, models, op-ed, opinion, polar bears, population size, predictions, prey, resilience, ringed seals, Southern Beaufort, stable, starvation, starving bears, thick spring ice
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