It’s very open drift ice (1-4/10th concentration) but still: Bear Island (Bjørnøya) in the southern Barents Sea was still surrounded by pack ice at 15 May 2020. As far as I can tell from the Norwegian Ice Service archived ice charts, this hasn’t happened since 2003.
And last week, the island was surrounded by heavy drift ice, which hadn’t happened on 8 May since 1977.
Comments Off on Still pack ice around Bear Island in the Barents Sea on 15 May: last time was 2003
Posted in Sea ice habitat
Tagged Barents Sea, Bear Island, Bjørnøya, Jan Mayen Island, Norwegian Ice Service, sea ice, Svalbard
Polar bear habitat is close to average for this date all over the Arctic this week. Barents Sea pack ice has increased substantially since last week and the ice in Eastern Canada is still well above average (and higher than 1979-early 1980s). Arctic ice has grown since a preemptive call for “the lowest maximum extent on record” was made by NSIDC last week — there is now at least as much ice for this date as there was in 2011 and almost as much as there was last year (2014).
Southern Davis Strait polar bears are out feeding on the glut of harp seals in the pack ice off Labrador and Newfoundland (discussed in detail here). One or more bears strayed a bit from the pack and ended up swimming around near the Hibernia oil platform (not far from the ice edge, although the CBC reports didn’t mention that “minor” fact), discussed in this recently updated post (with maps).
Harp seal female with nursing pup, DFO Canada.
Ice maps and graphs below: it’s worth a look.
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Comments Off on Polar bear habitat update – even more ice this week in the Barents Sea
Posted in Life History, Sea ice habitat
Tagged Barents Sea, Canadian Ice Service, CBC, denning females, Derocher, harp seals, Hibernia, Hopen Island, Labrador, Newfoundland, Norwegian Ice Service, NSIDC, oil platform, polar bears, sea ice, sea ice maximum, Svalbard, swimming
Polar bear habitat for the last week of March is well above average in eastern Canada for the second year in a row. The very low extent of ice in the Sea of Okhotsk – which has contributed strongly to the low maximum extent this year – is irrelevant to our discussion, since no polar bears live there.
There is a bit more concentrated ice around Svalbard than last year (or in 2012), although ice in the Barents Sea in general is still below average due to the state of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). The state of the AMO and its effects on Barents Sea polar bear sea ice habitat has nothing to do with global warming: it’s a cycle that has been documented for centuries (Miles et al. 2014).
Still, there is plenty enough sea ice for polar bear hunting: this is the beginning of the critical feeding time for all polar bears (see here and here), but especially for the survival of new cubs-of-the-year, so I have a few words about Western Hudson Bay cubs below.
Have a look for yourself.
Update: Added 20 March 2015, comparison maps from Cryosphere Today for 2006 vs. 2015.
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Comments Off on Polar bear habitat update – more spring sea ice around Svalbard than 2014 & 2012
Posted in Life History, Sea ice habitat
Tagged AMO, Barents Sea, Churchill, cubs of the year, Davis Strait, Norwegian Ice Service, polar bear, sea ice, spring ice conditions, spring ice maximum, Svalbard, western hudson bay
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