Starved polar bear pictured as ‘climate change ruins their habitats’

This tragic polar bear cuts a pitiful sight as she hunts desperately for food on the ice floes with an injured front leg. They need it to go in search of seals and other prey.

“In the first year, they lose their first cub”.

The photograph was captured by Kerstin Langenberger, who noticed the bear whereas on an Arctic wildlife tour in the Norwegian archipelago Svalbard.

Kristin Laidre, a researcher at the University of Washington’s Polar Science Center told Discovery News that walrus have been seen “hauling out” or gathering in Northwest Alaska, when previously they did this on sea ice.

“I realized that the fat bears are almost exclusively males which stay on the pack ice all year long”, she wrote.

“The females, on the other hand, which den on land to give birth to their young, are often slim”. With the pack ice retreating additional and additional north yearly, they are typically caught on land the place there’s not a lot meals …

The worldwide Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) now lists polar bears as “vulnerable” since their numbers have allegedly reduced by more than 30 percent in the last 45 years.

The photo, available below, was shared by the photographer on Facebook about a month ago. ‘I don’t think you can tie that one to starvation because of lack of sea ice, ‘ he added.

She said: ‘Yes, I have seen bears in good shape – but I have also seen dead and starving polar bears.

With the oncoming affects of global warming the female polar bears are particularly at risk since they spend most of their time on the pack ice taking care of their young and hunting for food.

Ms Langenberger said it was just one of several underweight female bears she had spotted on Svalbard.

Polar bears have become the fuzzy face of the impacts of climate change, with shrinking sea ice in the Arctic affecting how the bears normally roam and hunt.

He added “that reports and images of thin or dead adult bears from the Barents Sea region of late are concerning, and are also consistent with what we expect to see in a warming Arctic”.

The polar bear in the second picture died due to the absence of food.

Whereas there are some viable nutrient sources obtainable on land, reminiscent of hen eggs these aren’t current within the quantities that may maintain polar bear populations yr spherical, Rode defined. And it is our decision to trying to change this. Please follow me on @paulnicklen to learn more about the effects of climate change.

Vetter and his team found that the bears were so thin, their fat reserves had completely redistributed, going to sensitive vital organs such as the brain, kidneys and liver, in a last ditch stage to keep the animals alive.