Hug This Animal: Polar Bear
One of the most important things to consider when thinking about an endangered or vulnerable species is that we (plants, animals and humans) are all tied together. Our actions affect animals we’ll never meet thousands of miles away.
One great example of how our actions can affect animals we don’t see in our daily lives is the polar bear, the first animal in the new Hug This Animal series.
The polar bear was reclassified as a vulnerable species on the IUCN’s (World Conservation Union) Red List of Endangered Species in 2005. That means that polar bears face a high risk of extinction in the wild.
Biologists believe that between 20,000 and 25,000 polar bears live in the wild in Canada, Greenland/Denmark, Norway, Russian Federation, the United States and occasionally Iceland. (Stats and locations are from the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.)
Polar bear populations are expected to decline by 30 percent over the next 35 to 50 years. The main cause of this predicted decline is change in Arctic sea ice levels caused by global warming. Contamination is another concern. In some areas, polar bear testing has revealed high levels of PCBs and pesticides.
In other areas, ice is breaking up earlier than usual each year, forcing a shorter hunting period during critical feeding times surrounding hibernation. If you’d like to read a longer explanation written by scientists, go to the Polar Bear Specialist Group site.
How can you help stop the climate change affecting polar bear habitat?
•Reduce your contribution to carbon emissions by using public transportation, bikes or walking as often as possible. Move closer to work.
•Reduce carbon emissions from laundry: wash in cold and replace an older washing machine with a low-energy, low-water-use machine.
•Let your representative know that you don’t support drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. (Several politicians still support drilling in this refuge.)
•Tell your friends about small steps (many of the things we talk about on this blog) that can be taken to help secure a future for polar bears.
As Bradley Trevor Greive, author of Priceless: The vanishing beauty of a fragile planet, says of our reach:
“You must understand that you are the whole world, not just the space inside your clothes.”
Tags: Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Endangered Species Act, Global Warming, polar bears, Red List of Endangered Species, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, vulnerableRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Hug this Animal
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