Monday, May 4, 2009
Unfortunately, this photo speaks volumes about what is happening with polar bears in our world today. Due to factors like climate changes, global warming, poaching, and illegal trade, they have been placed on the threatened species list by the IUCN-The World Conservation Union and the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA). Many in the conservation community believe that if these trends continue, polar bears will become extinct in the next 100 years.
With a significant amount of polar ice melting in the Arctic due to global warming, this causes an enormous threat and devastation for the polar bears as they are dependent on this ice so they can hunt their prey. Oftentimes, polar bears simply drown from exhaustion in a fruitless attempt to find the ice that has already melted. These large carnivores are a good indicator of the rest of the eco-system in that region as they are very sensitive to changes.
According to the WWF’s website, “Some scientists have predicted that the summer Arctic sea ice could be gone entirely as early as 2013.“Based on the best available science, if current sea ice trends continue, two-thirds of the world’s polar bears will be lost by 2050,” said Geoffrey York, coordinator of WWF’s Polar Bear Conservation Program.”
The World Wildlife Fund has set out to protect the polar bears by meeting with leading conservationists in the world, researching the polar bears with their teams of scientists, tracking polar bears, and contacting government officials about the issue. Click here to find out how you can help this threatened species, donate to the WWF, and even symbolically adopt a polar bear of your own!
