Almost a year after that paper's publication, a group
of polar bear biologists including Stirling and Derocher published a response in Ecological Complexity.
Just keep reminding yourself that all the hype has very little to do with the conservation status of polar bears and virtually everything to do with the survival of the IUCN PBSG as an organization and the economic future
of polar bear biologists and their ever - growing crop of students.»
Not exact matches
«It is possible that Svalbard may have provided one such important refuge during warming periods, in which small
polar bear populations survived and from which founder populations expanded during cooler periods,» argues
biologist Charlotte Lundqvist
of the University at Buffalo, The State University
of New York, who is a co-author
of the new study.
NEXT week, we shall explore the reasons for
biologists dressing up to try to convince reindeer they are
polar bears, the icky secrets
of innovative sausages and the amazing curative powers
of salt pork (under medical supervision).
As their hunting behavior shifts from ice to land, the
polar bears «have progressively arrived earlier and earlier to have access to more eggs,» says
biologist Børge Moe, another principal author
of the study who works at the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research in Kongsfjorden, where seabird egg predation is just beginning to increase.
It is pushing for new oil and gas drilling in
polar bear habitat while
biologists for Interior Department, prodded by legal action, recommended the
bear be given threatened status under the species act because
of the warming
of the Arctic and summer retreat
of sea ice.
July 31, 2011, 11:35 a.m. Updated There's been a rush to all manner
of judgments over the strange case
of Charles Monnett, the
biologist for the Bureau
of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement who provided a powerful talking point for climate campaigners, including former Vice President Al Gore, with his description
of several drowned
polar bears spotted during an aerial marine - mammals survey in 2004 — an observation enshrined in a short paper published in
Polar Biology in 2006.
[Oct. 2, 2012, 1:23 p.m. Updated Charles Monnett, the federal
biologist at the heart
of the investigation described below, has been cleared
of scientific misconduct over his
polar bear surveys (report link), but his case remains a source
of disputes at several levels — as described in detail by Jill Burke in Alaska Dispatch.
The new
polar bear paper is by a group
of authors led by Steven Amstrup, the United States Geological Survey
polar bear biologist who led the government analysis
of the
bear's prospects.
Linda Gormezano, a
biologist at the American Museum
of Natural History, has been studying the
polar bear population along the western shore
of Hudson Bay.
There is rising concern among
polar bear biologists that the big recent summertime retreats
of sea ice in the Arctic are already harming some populations
of these seal - hunting predators.
This is the main reason
biologists have concerns for the long - term welfare
of polar bears, which have a harder time sustaining their weight and reproducing when summertime ice is thin.
Steven C. Amstrup, the federal
biologist who led an analysis last year concluding that the world's
polar bear population could shrink two thirds by 2050 under moderate projections for retreating summer sea ice, is once again in the field along Alaska's Arctic coast, studying this year's brood
of cubs, yearlings and mothers.
Steven C. Amstrup, a
biologist with the United States Geological Survey, poses with the cubs
of a sedated
polar bear.
In my piece weighing the merits
of very different strategies for giving ice - dependent
polar bears a chance in a warming world, I promised I'd post the views
of some
of the
biologists, sea - ice researchers and climate scientists who've been tracking relevant questions.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 27 — The Interior Department proposed Wednesday to designate
polar bears as a threatened species, saying that the accelerating loss
of the Arctic ice that is the
bears» hunting platform has led
biologists to believe that
bear populations will decline, perhaps sharply, in the coming decades.
While Mr. Kempthorne and Dale Hall, director
of the Fish and Wildlife Service, said Wednesday that they saw no separate risk to
polar bears from oil and gas activity, the latest assessment
of the species for the International Conservation Union, by a group
of experts including Fish and Wildlife Service
biologists, did include such activity in a list
of threats, including toxic contaminants, shipping and recreational viewing.
A new paper that combines paleoclimatology data for the last 56 million years with molecular genetic evidence concludes there were no biological extinctions [
of Arctic marine animals] over the last 1.5 M years despite profound Arctic sea ice changes that included ice - free summers:
polar bears, seals, walrus and other species successfully adapted to habitat changes that exceeded those predicted by USGS and US Fish and Wildlife
polar bear biologists over the next 100 years.
The low - ice future that
biologists said would doom
polar bears to extinction by 2050 has already happened in 8 out
of the last 10 years.
It's bad enough when it's a leading
polar bear biologist making such a ridiculous claim but there is no reason at all to take the scientifically baseless word
of Sebastian Copeland on this matter.
As a physical scientist rather than a
biologist, I am generally reluctant to get involved in such topics as the influence
of climate on
polar -
bear population, health and biology.
USGS
polar bear biologist Karyn Rode and colleagues (press release here) have tried to frame this issue as one about future survival
of polar bears in the face
of declining sea ice.
A new paper by
polar bear biologists (Rode et al. 2015) argues that terrestrial (land - based) foods are not important to
polar bears now and will not be in the future — a conclusion I totally agree with — but they miss the point entirely regarding the importance
of this issue.
Canadian
biologist Dr. Mitchell Taylor, one
of the foremost authorities on
polar bears, says: «We're seeing an increase in
bears that's really unprecedented, and in places where we're seeing a decrease in the population it's from hunting, not from climate change.»
Five years after wildlife
biologist Charles Monnett's 2006 observations
of dead
polar bears, believed to have drowned because
of disappearing Arctic ice, Interior started an investigation
of Monnett's science.
Internal memorandums circulated in the Alaskan division
of the Federal Fish and Wildlife Service appear to require government
biologists or other employees traveling in countries around the Arctic not to discuss climate change,
polar bears or sea ice if they are not designated to do so.
So various tame conservation
biologists came up with all sorts
of nonsense about how
polar bear populations were dwindling and how the melting
of the ice floes would jeopardize their ability to feed themselves etc..
WASHINGTON — More than 150
biologists and climate scientists today called on the Obama administration to follow the best available science in deciding the level
of protection
polar bears will get under the Endangered Species Act.
The lead author was Markus Dyck, a
polar bear biologist for the Canadian territory
of Nunavut.
I could be wrong, but my guess is that compared to all varieties
of climate research, the carbon footprint
of polar bear field
biologists exceeds them (or comes damn close to it), except perhaps the ice - core folks.
Oddly,
polar bear biologists chose to dispel the serious concerns over invasive research by presenting the outputs
of computer models.