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The polar bears were filmed on Kong Karls Land, a group of islands between the Barents Sea and the Artic Ocean. Part of Norway, it is a land where the midnight sun lasts from April 20 to August 23, and the polar night lasts from October 26 to February 15.

Polar bear facts

• The polar bear gets all the liquid it needs from its food -– its main source being the ringed seal — so it has no need to drink water.
• Polar bears will travel hundreds of miles in search of food and can swim 12 miles a day.
• The polar bear is so well adapted to retaining heat that it can’t run long distances because it would be in danger of overheating.
• Polar bears are the largest land predator in the world. Males can grow up to about 8 feet and weigh up to 1,800 pounds.
• Even with their mother’s care, only 50% of the polar bear cubs survive their first year, and more are lost when they first leave their mother to make their way alone.
• While waiting to catch seals, a polar bear will cover its black nose with its paw to make its white camouflage perfect.

By Barbara Kessler

The polar bear will be granted “threatened” status under the Endangered Species Act, the Bush Administration announced today, because the Arctic ice the animal needs to survive is shrinking and scientific projections show it will jeopardize the polar bear’s survival prospects for decades to come. But the decision, delivered with caveats limiting its scope, will likely chill environmentalists’ hopes that protection for the polar bear could be pivotal in the fight against global warming.

Oil and gas companies will not need to change their plans to drill in the Alaskan Arctic, nor should any businesses in the lower 48 states worry about curtailing greenhouse gas emissions because of the polar bear’s new status, said Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne, in announcing the decision Wednesday.

“While the legal standards under the ESA compel me to list the polar bear as threatened, I want to make clear that this listing will not stop global climate change or prevent any sea ice from melting. Any real solution requires action by all major economies for it to be effective.”

Because the Endangered Species Act is “not the right tool” for adjusting climate policy, Kempthorne said he was issuing special “guidance” with his decision to insure that in the course of protecting the polar bear there is no “unintended harm to the society and economy of the United States.”

Oil drilling within the bear’s habitat — including recently signed oil leases in the Chukchi Sea — is not “mutually exclusive” with protecting the bear, he said, noting that ice loss, not drilling was threatening the polar bear, which already enjoys some protections from business activities under the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

Environmentalists who’ve been fighting for the polar bear for years lauded the administration’s step forward, but bristled at the mixed signals in the announcement. “There was good news and bad news for the polar bear today,” France Beinecke, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council wrote to supporters.

“The bad news? The Bush Administration’s plan for ‘protection’ is so full of loopholes for oil companies and other polluters that it could be the equivalent of sending a leaky lifeboat to rescue drowning polar bears…” she wrote.

Carl Pope, head of the Sierra Club, issued a more scathing statement: “Allowing destructive energy development in polar habitat is akin to diagnosing someone with lung cancer and then handing them a lit cigarette. There is no environmentally-sound way to drill in polar bear habitat. Drilling would inundate polar bear habitat with pipelines, well pads, boat traffic, ice-breaking vessels, and seismic blasting, not to mention the ever-present threat of oil spills.”

Kempthorne said in a news conference that he wished he could have made a different decision on the polar bear (presumably not having to declare the bear in peril?), but was hemmed in by the “inflexible” law requiring him to make a decision based on the likelihood of that the polar bear’s survival will be endangered in the near future.

Several computer models consulted, included one by the International Panel on Climate Change, show historical loss of Arctic sea ice since the mid-20th Century and project that the trend will continue, he and other officials said. Scientific evidence also shows that the bear’s health and reproduction has declined in some of the areas with the worse loss of ice floes, which the animal needs for hunting.

In the news conference, Kempthorne, Dale Hall, director of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (charged with studying and monitoring the polar bear), and other officials sought to clarify the government’s seemingly contradictory statements pronouncing an animal threatened by conditions caused by global warming, while simultaneously declaring that global warming cannot be shown to be the direct cause of that animal’s plight.

They explained that the studies they relied upon did not directly “connect the dots” between global warming and the polar bear as required by the fine print of the ESA, which hadn’t foreseen global warming as a potential destroyer of habitats.

“We know the earth is warming.’’ Kempthorne said. “We know man is a factor in that. But we don’t’ know what extent that issue is having (on the polar bear).”

The administration was clearer in explaining its attendant message that the polar bear’s threatened status is no threat to business as usual. Oil and gas leases, Kempthorne said, “will go forward.”

Copyright © 2008 | Distributed by Noofangle Media

Are polar bears in danger of extinction? U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken in Oakland wants to know, and has given the Bush administration two more weeks to find out.

Judge Wilken said today that the administration had no legitimate reason for failing to meet a January 9 deadline (one year after the bear was proposed for listing) on declaring the bears endangered or not. The judge directed the Department of the Interior to issue its decision by May 15 to comply with the Endangered Species Act. The court ruling resulted from a lawsuit brought by three environmental organizations — the Center for Biological Diversity, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Greenpeace — in which the plaintiffs cite bears’ rapidly shrinking natural habitat: Diminished ice coverage at the poles has meant that bears have fewer places to seek food; starvation and lower rates of reproduction have been observed in recent years as warming trends melt the ice.

“Today’s decision is a huge victory for the polar bear,” said Kassie Siegel, climate program director at the Center for Biological Diversity in a statement. “By May 15^th the polar bear should receive the protections it deserves under the Endangered Species Act, which is the first step toward saving the polar bear and the entire Arctic ecosystem from global warming.”

Siegel authored the 2005 petition seeking protection for the polar bear. Other environmentalists shared her elation over today’s decision to stop the delays by the current administration.

“The federal court has thrown this incredible animal a lifeline,” said Andrew Wetzler, director of NRDC’s Endangered Species Project. “The Endangered Species Act requires the decision to be based solely on science, and the science is absolutely unambiguous that the polar bear deserves protection.”

While such court rulings can have a built-in waiting period, Wilkin made a point of negating that in this case. With efforts currently underway to start drilling for oil in the Chukchi Sea, potential protection under the Endangered Species Act has serious ramifications on oil exploration; it would also require the Fish and Wildlife service to start planning ways to rebuild polar bear populations.

According to the NRDC, a study by the government’s own U.S. Geological Survey “predicted that two-thirds of the world’s polar bear population would likely be extinct by 2050, including all polar bears within the United States. Several leading scientists now predict the Arctic could be ice-free in the summer as early as 2012.”

To learn more about the polar bear, visit the NRDC’s polar bear facts section.

Photo: National Resources Defense Council.

Copyright © 2008 | Distributed by Noofangle Media