Polar Bears Resort To Cannibalism As Arctic Ice Shrinks

CNN:

Summer is over in the northern hemisphere, but it's been another chilling season for researchers who study Arctic sea ice.

"It's definitely a bad report. We did pick up little bit from last year, but this is over 30 percent below what used to be normal," said Walt Meier, a research scientist with the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado.

Read the whole story: CNN

Comments

[iPolitics]

12:38 AM on 09/26/2008

That's Palin's state

[LITU]

03:12 PM on 09/25/2008

Speaker on U-Dub-TV pointed out the most pertinent component of the argument. It isn't about the new ice floating on the surface, it's the old ice beneath it that raises the fear.

[Exusian]

03:00 PM on 09/25/2008

Interesting graphic on NSID's Arctic Sea Ice page comparing the age of multiyear ice at the end of the 2007 melt to this year:
http://www.nsidc.org/images/arcticseaicenews/20080924_Figure3.jpg

Note how much less there currently is of 6/6+, 5, 4, 3 and 2 year old ice this year compared to last year, and that new 1 year old ice makes up more than half of what did not melt. That will all be 2 year ice next summer.

[realpolitic]

06:05 AM on 09/26/2008

Yes, the older, thicker ice is really melting rapidly. The ice mass must be declining really rapidly.

[Exusian]

12:51 PM on 09/26/2008

Actually, a lot of the older multiyear ice flushed right out of the Arctic Ocean through the Fram Strait last *winter* and melted in the North Atlantic!

It will be interesting to watch what happens this winter and next summer.

[realpolitic]

01:51 PM on 09/26/2008

It that the usual process- it detaches and floats away to melt or does it usually melt where it is? The overall ice must be considerably thinner. I have seen submarine reports saying so and I know they can measure the mass from space. I wonder how long before we see significant ocean rise? I think most to now has been through thermal expansion.

[realpolitic]

01:52 PM on 09/26/2008

Did you notice that the press announced today that five northeastern states were implementing a carbon trading system? It should be interesting.

[realpolitic]

12:55 PM on 09/25/2008

Conservatives will be angry if they can no longer get their polar bear burgers down at the fast food restaurant.

[natureman]

01:20 PM on 09/25/2008

Don't they serve those at McD's now?

[realpolitic]

01:35 PM on 09/25/2008

I don't eat there. Ask Salgle!

[DanSmith]

10:48 AM on 09/25/2008

Check out this revelation about pollution.
http://www.thedailygreen.com/healthy-eating/eat-safe/factory-farms-47092401?src=syn&dom=yah_buzz&mag=tdg&ha=1&kw=ist

[LITU]

12:12 AM on 09/25/2008

Deniers will say, "Oh, they do that once in awhile. It's a cyclic thing."

[realpolitic]

09:56 PM on 09/24/2008

"Between 24 January and 10 April 2004, we confirmed three instances of intraspecific predation and cannibalism in the Beaufort Sea. One of these, the first of this type ever reported for polar bears, was a parturient female killed at her maternal den. The predatory bear was hunting in a known maternal denning area and apparently discovered the den by scent. A second predation event involved an adult female and cub recently emerged from their den, and the third involved a yearling male. During 24 years of research on polar bears in the southern Beaufort Sea region of northern Alaska and 34 years in northwestern Canada, we have not seen other incidents of polar bears stalking, killing, and eating other polar bears. We hypothesize that nutritional stresses related to the longer ice-free seasons that have occurred in the Beaufort Sea in recent years may have led to the cannibalism incidents we observed in 2004."

http://alaska.usgs.gov/science/biology/polar_bears/unusual_mortality.html

[NL207]

02:07 AM on 09/27/2008

What effect do you suppose the intraspecific cannibalization of 3 Polar Bears will have on the survival prospects of teh species as a whole?

"Contrary to the intuitive expectation cannibalism of the predator leads to an increase of the standing stocks of both, prey and predator."
source: http://www.springerlink.com/content/5j26g73607546pg9/

I like your quote:

"We hypothesize that nutritional stresses related to the longer ice-free seasons that have occurred in the Beaufort Sea in recent years may have led to the cannibalism incidents we observed in 2004"

An unproven hypothesis presented by Realpolitic in the absence of competitive viewpoints as fact. I will make a counter hypothesis that has as more supporting data than your experts':

I hypothesize that the restriction of Inuit predation on Polar Bears by Government regulation in 1973 has led to a significant, measureable increase in the Polar Bear Population over the last 35 years no less than 25%, which in turn has increased competition for scarce food resources amongst the bears thereby promoting intraspecific cannibalism.

It has the same validity as the 'expert' opinion and at least is grounded in fact.

The truth is, your experts have no idea if cannibalism among Polar Bears has ever occurred before because there is so little data on these bears prior to 35 years ago. All they can say is they have not witnessed this before. they cannot say they can rule out such occurrences with confidence.

[realpolitic]

10:29 AM on 09/27/2008

According to your citation, "(2) survival of the population in circumstances in which absence of cannibalism would lead to exxtinction."

Well even humans have eaten other humans when faced with imminent starvation. So therefore I do not know if polar bear predation on other bears will lead to an increase of standing stock or more likely delay possible starvation.

I think if interspecies predation was common among polar bears scientists would know through Inuit stories. The Inuit have hunted the bears for millenia. Scientists would confirm this practice with them.

As fas as you hypothesis, it is based on your ideology. Seal populations are not declining. I am sure the food source is there if bears could reach them. Consider this:

The most important time for polar bears to feed on ringed seals is from late spring to breakup, when newly weaned ringed seal pups, up to 50 percent fat by wet weight and
still naïve to predators, are abundant. Thus, over the last 30 years, the polar bears in Western Hudson Bay have been forced to abandon hunting seals on the sea ice at the most important time of year and begin their fast on land following breakup at progressively earlier dates. There is a significant negative relationship between the date of breakup and the condition of both adult male polar bears and adult females accompanied by dependent young (Stirling et al. 1999).

http://pbsg.npolar.no/docs/StirlingDerocher-WildProf-2007.pdf p.5 of 7

[johnnyjust]

08:49 PM on 09/24/2008

It's amusing how people are so easily fooled. Usually a headline is enough.

[realpolitic]

02:59 AM on 09/25/2008

Yes, that is all it takes- just a grand conspiracy among ll the world's scientists. Sure!!!!

[MGhamma]

01:42 PM on 09/25/2008

Ya, all it takes is a headline....that's backed up by overwhelming evidence and detailed analysis by the top experts in the field, and endorsed by virtually the entire scientific community. That's what it takes to fool me.

[nastyvirus]

08:08 PM on 09/24/2008

Humans have that behavior embedded in their genes too. Cannibalism and meat-eating are programmed into all living things, even plants. Feel free to discuss Bush's idea amongst yourselves.

[thedailymccain]

07:24 PM on 09/24/2008

Incredibly - John McCain now believes that Global Warming is not man-made. See this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=edYxCNSZWds

[natureman]

10:52 AM on 09/25/2008

Wow that's hard to believe. I enjoy the man-made warming of Mars myself.... and how we're making the sun heat up..... oh and how the US contributes less than 2% of all greenhouse gases. Oh and how in the last one hundred years, the average temperature has gone up one degree. Oh and how they are predicting it will only go up another one or two degrees in the next one hundred years. Oh and not to mention the ice ages and the global warmings of the past before the industrial age. Should I keep going or suspend myself in disbelief that McCain believes that Global Warming is not man-made

[realpolitic]

08:19 AM on 09/26/2008

Slagle has a new apostle. Congratulations!!!

[Quaoar]

11:02 PM on 09/26/2008

Sounds like you regurgitated all of the right wing denialist talking points correctly. Have a brownie.

[VeroucaSalt]

06:50 PM on 09/24/2008

Pretty soon humans will have to resort to cannibalism, too. Oh wait, the Republicans are already eating the poor, so I guess it's already started.

[natureman]

10:52 AM on 09/25/2008

I have dibs on your legs.

[twgbonehead]

10:14 AM on 09/26/2008

You can have the "Gammy" one.

[loax]

05:42 PM on 09/24/2008

But according to Sarah they are no longer an endangered species. The have no natural habitat to live in with the ice flows disappearing, but they are not endangered? Sand she wants to be VP?

[natureman]

10:54 AM on 09/25/2008

Let's see. 5,000 polar bears in 1950. 25,000 polar bears now. They're practically extinct!! lol.... It's ashame you worship Al Gore and his fake worries of the polar bears.

[realpolitic]

12:56 PM on 09/25/2008

Can I worship Gore? It is ashame you worship knowing absolutely nothing at all.

[quadman]

05:12 PM on 09/24/2008

Interesting, the headline suggests that cannibalism is up amongst the bears right now. However, the article has one documented incidence from 2004. Hmmmm....

[lucite]

04:24 PM on 09/24/2008

Palin, whose husband is a production operator for BP on Alaska's North Slope, has sued the federal government over its listing of the polar bear as an endangered species threatened by global warming, and she has fought to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and Alaska's coast to oil drilling.
the words of RF Kennedy Jr

[ramal]

03:15 PM on 09/24/2008

Polar bears now, human beings in a few more decades.

[JT16682]

03:27 PM on 09/24/2008

You are right; in fact the 700 billion bailout by taxpayers is kinda of cannibalism.

[natureman]

03:52 PM on 09/24/2008

I have dibs on your legs.