Still Waiting for the Sea Ice
“It’s tough being a polar bear in Hudson Bay these days.”—biologist Andrew Derocher
Two years ago, on Nov. 2, 2014, as I flew back to Churchill, Manitoba from a remote camp in the Territory of Nunavut, the sea ice on Hudson Bay had yet to freeze. During my week there photographing polar bears, I learned from local Inuit guides that the ice season now arrives about three weeks later than before, but I was assured the ice would soon appear.
The sea ice did eventually form that year, and 2015. But it is now Dec. 11, 2016, and there is barely any measurable sea ice anywhere in Hudson Bay.
“In November, the sea ice extent averaged 9.08 million square kilometers (3.52 million square miles) — the lowest November extent in the satellite record,” stated NASA Earth Observatory* on December 6. Put another way, the area of sea ice that’s missing is the size of Mexico.
Many visitors come to Churchill each year, which bills itself as the “polar bear capital of the world.” They come in October and November as the bears gather in preparation to head out to the sea ice.
Churchill was my jumping-off point. As an environmental journalist and nature photographer, I wanted to go beyond the tourist sites. What I saw, experienced and learned from our guides was at once amazing and scary.
Polar bears—of which there are only 26,000 in the world—live on a diet of ringed seals and bearded seals. They are only able to hunt these animals during the winter, when the bears can get far out on the sea ice. A polar bear has a powerful sense of smell, which helps it locate seals over great distances. Their strong claws can easily haul a 200-pound seal out of the water for dinner.
From spring to fall, as the ice melts, polar bears come back on land. They may munch on kelp, or bird eggs, or human garbage, but these don’t provide the calories and fat that the bears need to survive and reproduce. It’s as if we tried to live on popcorn.
Andrew Derocher, a biologist from the University of Alberta, has been studying polar bears since 1984. “Back then, there were about 1,200 bears living in the core monitoring area between the Churchill River and Nelson River,” he wrote on Friday. “Now we see fewer cubs (and rarely triplets), few roly-poly bears, a lot of skinny bears, and far fewer bears overall.”
The polar bear population in the region has declined by a third since Derocher first came to Churchill. And worse is yet to come.
The worldwide polar bear population could shrink by 30 percent in the next 40 years, say researchers in a study published last week. That could mean the loss of almost 8,000 bears.
“Loss of Arctic sea ice owing to climate change is the primary threat to polar bears throughout their range,” concluded the scientists from the U.S., Canada and Norway.
The study looked at the average generational lifespan of polar bears in the wild, which it placed at 11.5 years. They found that the length of annual sea ice cover grew shorter by 1.26 days per year from 1979 to 2014. Running a variety of computer simulations, they found a strong chance of losing at least 30 percent of the total bear population over three generations—about 35 to 41 years.
But this year’s record-warm Arctic temperatures and record-low sea ice have scientists frightened.
“This was my fifth time in Churchill, and I was shocked at the difference from the last four,” said Dr. Sybille Klenzendorf, a senior biologist at the World Wildlife Fund. “The temperature was 35 degrees warmer than any of the times before.”
“The whole week there I felt excited to have amazing bear photography in sunny, warm days, but was feeling panicked that November 2016 might be the tipping point for a fast decline of the Western Hudson Bay polar bear population,” she added.
There are 19 subpopulations of polar bears and not all regions will experience the same effects. The Western Hudson Bay population and the Southern Beaufort Sea population, which declined 40 percent from 2000 to 2010, are among the most vulnerable.
Female polar bears don’t begin to mate until they are four or five years old and typically produce only five litters in their lifetime. Their denning success may be at risk from delayed sea ice freezes, thinner ice and other factors.
“Reproductive rates are tanking and the body condition is still declining. Is Nov. 30, 2016 the panic button for Western Hudson Bay bears?” asked Klenzendorf.
Five countries are home to polar bears: the U.S., Canada, Russia, Greenland and Norway. All except Greenland are major oil-producing nations.
“This year’s warm weather and lack of ice and snow brought home the impacts of climate change to a global audience,” reported Alysa McCall, staff scientist and director of conservation outreach at Polar Bears International.
The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) lists the polar bear as a vulnerable species.
“We won’t really know what the late freeze-up in 2016 will mean for the Western Hudson Bay population until 2017. It’s likely not good but a late break-up in 2017 would help,” said Derocher.
Because the bears need sea ice to hunt, scientists estimate that if they are forced to stay on land more than 210 days, only half will survive.
During my time on the tundra, with help from our guides, I began to understand the behavior of these magnificent, endangered animals.
Since my return, I’ve exhibited and published my photos and stories, and spoken to audiences about my adventures. My intent is to return within a year or two to continue documenting and exploring the story of polar bears in a world that’s warming beyond their control.
* NASA’s Earth science division has been targeted for defunding by Trump advisors.
