Polar Bear Standing On Ice
October 26 2017 by biodiversity with ben in 2017 scicomm students conservation.
Polar bear standing on ice. Pushed further out onto the ice or stranded on the shore polar bears like many other large carnivores are under severe threat. Svalbard expedition wwf international gert polet wwf. The polar bear ursus maritimus is a hypercarnivorous bear whose native range lies largely within the arctic circle encompassing the arctic ocean its surrounding seas and surrounding land masses it is the largest extant bear species as well as the largest extant predatory carnivore. Due to global warming the natural environment of the polar bear in the arctic has changed a lot.
The arctic sea has much less ice than it had some years ago. As climate change disproportionately warms the arctic the future looks increasingly bleak for. A boar adult male weighs around 350 700 kg 772 1 543 lb while a sow adult female is about half. From an ice pack polar bears can prey on seals.
A polar bear standing on melting sea ice in svalbard norway in 2013. A polar bear managed to get on one of the last ice floes floating in the arctic sea. Standing on thin ice. On average polar bears on all fours are 3 5 to 5 feet 1 to 1 5 meters tall but when standing on its hind legs an adult male polar bear may reach more than 10 feet 3 m.
The polar bears in svalbard were abundant. A mascot is often seen as a wuss compared to the real athletes but this giant polar bear is proof the men and women in novelty suits are tough nuggets. The real issue however was the increased melting of sea ice on the archipelago.