A while back I blogged about "An Inconvenient Truth" and one of the stunning consequences of global warming that it revealed: The melting of the ice caps meant that polar bears were having to swim farther to reach their feeding areas and some of them were drowning on the long trips.
My friend Mike found this story from Reuters on the effects of the longer trips -- polar bears that couldn't make it or are much lighter if they do. Researchers found that polar bears in the Hudson Bay region on average dropped from 1,200 pounds in 1989 to 950 in 2004. That's a 26 percent decrease in body weight in 15 years, and more than 16 pounds a year.
The scientists even saw two bears in trouble.
"We saw a couple of polar bears in the sea east of Svalbard [a Norwegian archipelago] -- one of them looked to be dead and the other one looked to be exhausted," said Julian Dowdeswell, head of the Scott Polar Research Institute in England.
If nothing else, it has to make you question whether the skepticism about the effects of global warming is warranted. Can't we agree that governments should do more just in case global warming is the crisis that so many believe it is?
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1 comment:
First of all, allow me to tell you how great I think your Blog is. Really excellent.
Second, this situation with the global warming and the polar bears is one of the most sickening and disturbing things I've heard ( along with the recent dog massacre in China: http://www.americanchronicle.com/
articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=12527
I wish there was some way to help these poor creatures in need.
How do we stop those in the highest reaches of power from their abuses of our environment and our animals?
Keep the good work!
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