Starving polar bear nearing death shows the reality of climate change
Indiatoday
2017-12-10 18:37:32

Our worst nightmares are coming true-- and we are really scared. The news of starving polar bears isn't a first, but the fact that its coming so often is freaking us out.
Paul Nicklen and filmmakers from conservation group Sea Legacy arrived in the Baffin Islands, Canada to find a starving polar bear on its deathbed. Nicklen described to National Geographic the sight that brought tears to his eyes: the bony bear was scavenging in a rubbish bin for sustenance, stumbling over iceless terrain-- and finally gave up by slumping on the ground, awaiting death.
The bear
As the ice-borne animal was hours from death, it clung to life by struggling to walk on iceless land foraging for food in trashcans
Its white hair limply covered its thin, bony frame
One of the bear's back legs drags behind it as it walked, which Nat Geo says is likely due to muscle atrophy
When it finds nothing in the rubbish bin, it resignedly collapses back down onto the ground-- probably waiting for death
Nicklen and bears
Nicklen is no stranger to bears.

From the time he was a child growing up in Canada's far north, the biologist-turned-wildlife photographer has seen over 3,000 bears in the wild..
Nicklen's wrath
The emaciated polar bear, featured in videos that Nicklen put on social media on December 5, was one of the most gut-wrenching sights he's ever seen
"I filmed with tears rolling down my cheeks," Nicklen told National Geographic
Nicklen hopes the footage will send a larger message about the deadly consequences of global warming
The wildlife photographer adds that he filmed the bear's slow, beleaguered death because he didn't want it to die in vain
"When scientists say bears are going extinct, I want people to realize what it looks like. Bears are going to starve to death," Nicklen told Nat Geo. "This is what a starving bear looks like"
Why didn't Nicklen save the bear?
In the days since Nicklen posted the footage, he's been asked why he didn't intervene
"Of course, that crossed my mind," Nicklen told Nat Geo. "But it's not like I walk around with a tranquilizer gun or 400 pounds of seal meat"

And even if he did, Nicklen claimed, he only would have been prolonging the bear's misery
Plus, feeding wild polar bears is illegal in Canada
The cause: Global warming
Polar bears have long been suffering the impacts of global warming as the first ones to suffer effects of warming temperatures and rising seas
The arctic region animals survive on seals that they find on sea ice. With rising and warming seas, the summer brings starvation for polar bears as they await ice solidification to happen
In 2002, a World Wildlife Fund report predicted that climate change could eventually lead to polar bear endangerment or extinction

The report also found that polar bears were moving from ice to land earlier and staying on land longer, unhealthily extending the bears' fasting season
By the end of summer, most bears studied by the World Wildlife Fund showed signs of starvation
Baffin Island, where the footage was captured, has been particularly hard hit by the warming climate and loss of ice
More studies prove the same
15 years later, polar bears' icy hunting grounds are in even worse shape. The National Snow and Ice Data Center, which tracks sea ice cover annually, has regularly noted record lows in sea ice coverage -- a decline that is expected to only get worse
A study recently published in the journal Biosciences looked at how climate science is often falsely discredited. The study found climate deniers are able to downplay the threat of climate change by discrediting the threat facing polar bears

However, a study published last year by the European Geosciences Union and this year by the U.S. Geological Survey confirms melting sea ice continues to be an existential threat to polar bears.
(Image(s) credits: Paul Nicklen/ Nat Geo)
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