Rebato, Raissa P.

II-14 BscieBio

Global Warming and Polar Bears

Global warming refers to an increase in the Earth's average atmospheric
temperature. It is a human-induced climate change. It is caused by the increasing
amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere due to burning of fossil fuels and such.
Global warming has been a concern since then but today it has become a threat to the
balance of our ecological system. Ursus maritimus, or polar bear is currently on the
verge of becoming extinct. There are an estimated 20, 000 polar bears in the wild which
depends upon the sea ice. The loss of their sea ice habitat on the Arctic due to global
warming had a great impact on their livelihood as well as on their entire population size.
According to the article, there are three main effects of global warming on polar
bears. Since they spend most of their time at sea than it does on land, the growing loss
of sea ice has caused declination in their population size. In 2011, there was a rapid
Arctic ice melt which triggered a female polar bear to swim for continuously nine days
across the Beaufort Sea. The Hudson Bay in Canada has no sea ice during summer
consequently polar bears barely eat or nothing at all. Attributable to these events, the
U.S. Geological Survey predicts that two-thirds of polar bears will disappear by 2050.
Retreating sea ice platforms makes swimming conditions of the polar bears more
precarious. As the gap of the ice from the shore becomes wider, polar bears have little
access from it. As a result, in 2004 a group of scientists found four drowned polar bears
in the Beaufort Sea and they suppose there were more. The scientists thought the
drowning was connected to the retreating ice and rougher seas.
Seals are the polar bears prey and they also live on sea ice. Therefore, seals
population will decline too if our atmosphere continues to warm. The reduction in ice
platforms near fish areas which seals eat distresses their health and reproduction rates.
Polar bears will starve eventually leading to an uncontrollable behaviour causing them
to kill even their cubs.
Upon reading this article, I realized that everyone should make immediate and
noteworthy actions to minimize global warming. It is never too late to help our polar
bears live longer. It is not only polar bears that will benefit but also other endangered
marine animals around the globe. Polar bears are part of our ecological system, if they
become extinct, and then there will be an imbalance in our nature. When that time
comes, our race will gradually vanish too.

Rebato, Raissa P.
II-14 BscieBio

REFERENCES:
Pratt, B. (Ed.). (n.d.). Global Warming and Polar Bears. Retrieved June 8, 2015, from
http://www.nwf.org/Wildlife/Threats-to-Wildlife/Global-Warming/Effects-on-Wildlife-andHabitat/Polar-Bears.aspx
Pollitt, D. (2011, May 9). What Are the Facts About the Global Warming Theory?
Retrieved June 8, 2015, from http://www.ehow.com/info_8388495_global-warmingtheory.html
Oblack, R. (n.d.). Global Warming vs. Climate Change. Retrieved June 8, 2015, from
http://weather.about.com/od/climatechange/f/global_warming_climate_change.htm