This newspaper ran a short video (several weeks ago) of a polar bear. One up in our neck of the woods--was it Canada? Alaska? I forget.
And it was horrifying. Horrifying! The creature must have lost a half to two thirds of his body weight. It left him looking like a large dog with white fur.
As he scrounged in a garbage dump somewhere. Or was it a garbage pail? I forget.
And I had the weirdest thought. A thought that never once crossed my mind--not in sixty nine years of life! And I've got my hand on a stack of Bibles, New York Times.
"You can eat ME if you like, Mr. Polar Bear. You might find me TASTY. Come on--treat yourself! You deserve a break today!"
Truly. At that moment, I longed to proffer myself to the bear. That wretched bear.
A bear meant (by God--or "nature" if you prefer)--a bear meant to be sleek and fat and formidable. As he roamed that snowy wasteland--stuffing himself with seal or fish or whatever.
Not this miserable starved creature.
And the Russians--what will they do? I feel for them--they got children. And no! I would NOT like my children to supply food for some starving polar bear.
But even the Russians (whom we now study with such narrowed suspicious eyes)--they too!--they got a heart.
I feel for them.
I feel for the polar bears.
I feel for all of us.
Lord help us all.
9
People shoud leave alone poor bears...
3
I propose that the bears be deported to Año Nuevo beach (in California). That would solve two problems (bears and elephant seals) at the same time.
The bears are coming! The bears are coming!
I am not one for needlessly harming wildlife, but if people are in imminent danger of carnivorous animals strong enough to break down doors if they smell food, they need access to guns powerful to knock down the bear on one shot. Bear spray is fine, and I would strongly recommend it, but I would not want to face an animal that powerful without a lethal option. Once again, I no blood lust for bears. I simply would have no desire to be a polar bear’s meal.
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@Anthony Cheeseboro
People want the whole world, every last inch of it.
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Would you be willing to sacrifice your life or that of your family to an apex predator for your principles? Far too often, people who will never have to worry about an attack from a polar bear, Siberian Tiger, lion, Grizzly Bear, etc. are critical of those who face the real possibility of being eaten when they protect themselves.
3
Russia is drilling for oil in the Arctic as climate change is good for them.
This picture is very symbolic of nature's attack on the worst country in the world, a virulent cancer on Mother Earth.
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The bears in the photo appear to be very well fed for the dead of winter.
1
Looks like these people may have to change their life style a bit. The dump first needs a strong fence and something to disguise the odor. People should have bull horns and carry spray ( as another person mentioned. Stopping bears from coming in a house is a tough problem esp a polar bear which might not be scared off as easily as a brown bear. Shooting them should be the last resort. Rubber bullets usually work in case someone is threatened.
4
Fill up a garbage dump with food waste that is easier to acquire than baby seals and fish, and polar bear tourism increases. No global warming is necessary. Human activity has caused polar bear migration to change. It isn't the SUVs.
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@ebmem Why don't you wait and see what the scientists determine. They said the jury is out.
1
Finally, some good news.
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If I were a polar bear I would be very angry. We have to change our ways as humans and begin to look within our hearts for the compassion that will save this planet and ourselves.
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Dr. Mordvintsev,
Please feed the bears. They are too beautiful to just let starve to death.
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Whatever intelligence the human race has, it is not enough to do what is necessary to live on this planet in harmony with that which created us.
We have failed. Most of us don't comprehend how responsible we are and how much we should be doing differently.
The main problem is that we have not accurately identified consciousness versus unconsciousness. Our unconsciousness runs deep and wide, and includes what most of us consider to be consciousness, when in fact it is another form of unconsciousness. Unconsciously irresponsible, that is us.
Working, playing, living, mostly done unconsciously. That's us.
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@Thinking
Yes, my favorite e is the religious leaders urging people to have as many children as possible, thus wiping out most other large mammals earth, with the exception of those we eat.
6
Kudos to Russia for protecting the polar bears as an endangered species. Perhaps equal concern might be extended to the country's independent journalists.
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Odd to think that the arctic is too small to accommodate bears.
The polar bear is highly evolved to eat, make some babies and self-preservation. Its brain knows how to hunt and find easy pickings. Polars can smell food up to 50 miles away.
They see people as a potential meal and polars are impartial to what color clothes their prey is wearing. People are easy to catch.
There are so few of these bears left, they cannot survive poison, bullets or depleted food sources.
4
It looks more like the Russian military invaded polar bear' territory not the other way around... as well as polluted it with their trash... Too bad bears can't stop those "invasions"... yet.
Should we ask if they want our advisers...? :))
34
Now THAT'S what I call a "polar vortex"!
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@Woodson Dart
Polar Vortex, part of Extreme Climate Change...
1
It looks like the food chain has been radically changed and distorted. Polar bear feeds mainly on seals and carcasses of sea mammals. Occasionally, on beluga whale and young walrus. Homo sapiens, the apex predator, has insatiable appetite for meat. Seals has been hunted for human consumption thereby disrupting the food chain as if they are not content yet with their blue fin tuna and New York marble steak as well as their ubiquitous burgers.
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@Uly Seals have not, except in very small numbers by Eskimos, been hunted for human consumption.
Bears are opportunist feeders. Garbage is easier to catch than seals.
6
Perhaps Russia's black and brown bears should start organizing rallies, demanding to build a wall on Russia's northern border, in order to keep all the hungry, ill-behaved white polar bears from swarming the country.
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@Leonid Andreev LOL!
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@Leonid Andreev
Bears are probably no better than we are at integration.
@onlein - they seem able to hit it off as pairs, at least.
"Grizzly-polar bear hybrids spotted in Canadian Arctic"
“We’ve known for a long time that hybrids between polar bears and grizzly bears were possible. We’ve known from zoo studies in Europe that you can take a male and female from either species and hybridise them, and that their offspring are fully fertile,” says polar bear scientist Andrew Derocher, from the University of Alberta, Canada, who studies polar bear populations in the Canadian Arctic and Hudson Bay.
“To date, all the confirmed hybrids are in Canada. But that doesn’t mean that they couldn’t exist in Russia for example, where these species come very close to each other, or in Alaska, where they also overlap,” he says."
http://sciencenordic.com/grizzly-polar-bear-hybrids-spotted-canadian-arctic
But it won't happen in Russia if Putin builds that wall!
5
Overfishing all.
Overfishing means no food for seals who need to go out deeper to eat, and bears cannot get to them.
It's not some made up hocus pocus, it's lack of food, because you took the fish away, it's real simple.
And those pictures of the starving bears? those were taken after a storm in the arctic, which blew the bear far from home and it slowly starved, but was purposely posted out of context by people with an agenda.
Regulate fishing, leave some for them seals, the bears will follow them. It's not that hard.
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@AutumnLeaf
Regulate human procreation.
Human demographic escalation is causing climate change with all the consequences afflicting these poor creatures of the animal kingdom.
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@AutumnLeaf - care to document how and by whom this part of the Arctic Ocean is being overfished? Also where (since it's not said in this article) do you get the idea that the bears are starving?
We know there's no overfishing by commercial fleets since fishing in the Arctic is banned for commercial fleets.
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/12/nations-agree-ban-fishing-arctic-ocean-least-16-years
Perhaps the reason the bears are spending more time on land is because, as documented for years, the ice they hunt off of is farther and farther from shores as the Arctic warms.
So unless you have some proof of this supposed overfishing, please, no hocus-pocus.
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@b fagan - I overstated the rule about Arctic fishing - that applies to international waters, not the Barents sea.
This 2018 report describes the recent improvement in joint Russian-Norwegian management of the shared Barents Sea fishery. One particular success they note is the tremendous decline in discarded catch by Russia as practices improved.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2018.00266/full
The IUCN Red List shows harps seals are of "Least Concern" with increasing numbers.
https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/41671/45231087
Here's what the Barents Observer says in an article about the bears:
"In recent years, polar bears have more frequently approached coastal towns in northern Russia, both on the mainland and on the archipelagoes. Due to shrinking sea ice the bears are often stranded on shore. Either because the sea ice retreat from shore much earlier in summer than before, or like on Novaya Zemlya, the sea simply does not freeze any more during winter."
https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/arctic/2019/02/declares-emergency-polar-bears-invades-military-town
1
humans overeat, overfish, overhunt, pollute, change landscapes and build dams that eventually break, occupy all possible stretch of lands and will not be happy untill all animals are vanished unless they can be put in a farm and eaten... fishermen routinely kill seals that are normal bear food because - they say - compete with them. How arrogant are we (they)?
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Polar bears have needs too! Dare I say rights?
A good example of nature asserting herself against the human claims of ownership and priority.
How will those threatened deal with their dilemma?
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Bear spray would seem the easy solution. It is extraordinarily effective, and would establish a proper respect for humans among the bear population. The only downside would be a small risk to the sprayer.
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@Lawrence
Is there such a thing as bear spray? I wonder what that spray would smells like and what it consists of. I know that fox urine is extremely effective in camouflaging a deer hunting blind. I think the risk to the sprayer may be anything but small.
2
It is the same thing as pepper spray. Non lethal, but stunningly strong. Routinely carried by hikers in the Rockies. Videos show charging grizzly bears instantly swapping ends and running away. Downside: the sprayer must be in your hand or you don't have time.
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@Lawrence
Thanks for the intel. I had no idea.
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"smell human food" "anthropogenic problem"
the article had a photo w/ caption saying that the bears were at a dump - another 'we have met the enemy, and he is us' problem
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"Conservation authorities turned down a request from the settlement to shoot the bears, which are protected in Russia as an endangered species."
Thank goodness Russia protects endangered species compared to another country I know so well which does not always prescribe to that mindset.
The "absence of sea ice around the southern portion of the Novaya Zemlya island chain this year has most likely forced more bears than usual onto shore". These creatures are hungry and are doing their best to survive. If anyone is at "fault" it is humans for allowing the environment to change to such a drastic point that even polar bears are behaving in more extreme measures than before.
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@Marge Keller
Black, Grizzly, and Polar Bears are omnivorous mammals.
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@Sam Freeman
They go where they smell food. And people resemble baby seals in the eyes of polar bears (at least that's what I've read about them and their very poor eye sight).
7
What would otherwise be heaven on earth for the polar bears, are unfortunately the harbinger of their ultimate fate, due to global warming...not to mention the human population there who must now fear for their own lives, as well.
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@Quandry
The place looks COLD to me!
4
@Sam Freeman It is the absence of sea ice that is displacing the animals. It is up for debate how/why the sea ice is absent. I for one subscribe to the climate change theory irrespective of the snowy terrain presented in this article.
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