Circumpolar Musings: Conservation and wildlife

Is Arctic walrus next protected species?

Amanda Graham — Wed, 13 Mar 2013 03:13:56 GMT

(Ben Anderson/Alaska Dispatch, 12 March 2013) -- Recently, a federal appeals court ruling determined that polar bears, those poster children of the effects of climate change, could keep their "threatened" status as listed under the Endangered Species Act, despite objections from the state of Alaska and other entities. Now, the Pacific walrus -- another species that calls Alaska home -- may become another animal to be listed on the basis of climate change's negative effect on its summer sea ice habitat. Another recent court ruling said that a determination can now be made on whether or not to include a backlog of more than 260 species for the endangered species list. ... The walrus was originally listed as a candidate for protection under the ESA in 2011, when a yearlong review by the FWS found that the walrus may merit eventual ESA safeguards. "After review of all the available scientific and commercial information, we find that listing the Pacific walrus as endangered or threatened is warranted," the agency wrote. "Currently, however, listing the Pacific walrus is precluded by higher priority actions to amend the Lists of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants." A big part of the recommendation came as a result of receding levels of summertime Arctic sea ice, widely attributed to warming temperatures related to climate change. 2007 marked a record low for Arctic sea ice extent, a record broken again just last year. In 1980, the U.S. Geological Survey says that Arctic sea ice covered about 7.5 million square kilometers. In 2012, it covered less than 3.5 million square kilometers. Those low ice extents were also what led to the polar bear's initial listing as threatened under the ESA in 2008, and Pacific walruses may now face the same fate.

'Protect reindeer' say Sweden’s indigenous Sami

Amanda Graham — Wed, 13 Mar 2013 02:58:33 GMT

(Radio Sweden via Eye on the Arctic, 11 March 2013) -- The Sami, an indigenous people living in northern Sweden, want higher compensation for their reindeer that are killed by other animals, reports Swedish Radio news. More than 5,000 bear, lynx, wolverine, and wolves are found in Sweden today. That's double the number of predatory wildlife from the time the reindeer compensation system was put in place in the mid-1990s. Most predatory animals live in reindeer areas. The Swedish National Sami Association says many of the 51 Sami reindeer herding communities are having a tough time. The association wants to reduce the numbers of predatory animals in their areas and get more in compensation for reindeer losses. Lena Ek, Sweden's Environmental Minister, says the issue will be taken up this fall when the government presents its plan for predatory wildlife. Sweden needs to be prepared to pay if it wants to continue to protect such animals, she says.

Reindeer capacity of pastures will be calculated in Yamal

Amanda Graham — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 23:27:10 GMT

(Sever-Press via Yamal.org, 6 March 2013) -- This year the Department of Agro-industrial Complex, Trade and Provision of Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug plans to undertake scientific and research work "Elaboration of the methodology for calculation of reindeer capacity of pastures on the territory of the region". The director of the department, Vyacheslav Kucherenko, explained the project to the conference of Yamal Union of Reindeer Herders, and said the methodology is intended to yield information for substantiating and taking administrative decisions on planning economic and nature-protecting activities and also use for practical aims by economic subjects. By his words, intensive industrial development of Yamal brings to decrease in territories of pastures. At the same time, number of domestic reindeer in the territory of Yamalskiy and Tazovskiy districts stays on the high level, which brings to more intensive use of reindeer pastures. Thus, it is necessary to elaborate the methodology and to calculate reindeer capacity of pastures on the territory of the region.

In rare joint effort, Russia and US team to help polar bears

Amanda Graham — Tue, 05 Mar 2013 00:35:49 GMT

(David M. Herszenhorn/New York Times via Anchorage Daily News, 4 March 2013) -- MOSCOW -- With relations between Russia and the United States increasingly frosty because of entrenched disagreements over Syria, child adoptions, missile systems and other issues, the two countries have quietly joined forces to help polar bears. Russia and the United States, two of the five countries where polar bears live, are now the main allies pushing for greater protection for the bears under a global treaty on endangered species, which is being reviewed this week at a conference in Bangkok. "It really seems that both countries were willing to put aside their differences in order to work together to help save the polar bear," said Jeffrey Flocken, North American regional director for the International Fund for Animal Welfare. Russia's decision to cooperate with the United States not only defies a recent wave of anti-Americanism here, but it also reverses Moscow's opposition to a similar U.S. proposal at the endangered species conference three years ago. The impetus for this shift may be the increasing danger to polar bears and the return to the presidency of Vladimir V. Putin, who often expresses his personal affection for wildlife and has declared 2013 to be the "Year of the Environment" in Russia.

Police seize 600 kilos of mammoth tusks in Far East

Amanda Graham — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 22:49:39 GMT

(RIA Novosti, 11 February 2013) -- BLAGOVESHCHENSK, February 11 (RIA Novosti) – Police in Russia’s Far East Amur Region have seized some 600 kilograms (1,320 pounds) of mammoth tusks from residents of the neighboring Republic of Yakutia, the regional interior affairs department said on Monday. “Police found 71 tusks weighing about 600 kilograms at a warehouse [in Blagoveschensk],” the department said, adding three men were planning to sell the tusks to Chinese nationals. Police are currently investigating whether the fossils were obtained legally. The world market price of mammoth tusk is almost equal to the price of silver. One kilogram is worth 5,000 rubles ($166) at international auctions in Yakutsk, capital of Yakutia. Some 90 percent of the mammoth remains found so far have come from Yakutia. The region’s extreme weather conditions and permafrost allow scientists to find their remains largely intact.

Coca-Cola kickstarts Arctic campaign with WWF donation

Amanda Graham — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 02:50:54 GMT

(Reuters, 17 January 2013) -- Coca-Cola will give 3 million euros ($4 million) to conservation group WWF over the next three years to help kickstart a campaign to protect the Arctic from the impacts of global warming, the world's biggest soft-drinks maker said. The Europe-wide campaign, which launched on Thursday in London, is aimed at raising awareness and funding to help protect the natural habitat of the polar bear, which is under threat from climate change. ... The campaign aims to raise awareness and funds in European countries for the plight of the polar bear. The money raised will go towards protecting an area in the Arctic where summer sea ice should last the longest, WWF and Coca-Cola said.

Conservationists want ban on products made from polar bears

Amanda Graham — Thu, 03 Jan 2013 20:21:35 GMT

(Brett Smith/RedOrbit, 26 December 2012) -- Some conservationists are calling for increased restrictions on the buying and selling of rugs and other goods made from polar bears—citing the animal’s threatened status. Others disagree—saying climate change is the bears’ biggest threat and focusing on their trade de-emphasizes the true reason behind their endangerment. The World Wildlife Fund (WWF), which has long championed the polar bears’ cause, takes the position that climate change, not international trade, is their most significant threat. “If we were tempted to support (a ban) on the basis of trade being a major threat, it is not,” Colman O’Criodain, WWF’s wildlife trade policy analyst, told BBC News. “You could say that this is just a distraction factor and that it could have the effect of making people think something has been done to address the threat when the net effect will be almost negligible,” he added. Officials at the Humane Society International/UK disagree, citing a 375 percent increase in the number of polar bear skins offered at auction over the past five years as evidence that the animals are being hunted more than ever. ... Where some see a battle to protect polar bears by banning the trade of certain products, others see a move to de-emphasize the activities responsible for climate change. “The American government is using the threat of climate change to justify banning the international trade in polar bear parts while utterly failing to do anything to reduce their own activities,” Inuit spokesman James Eetoolook of the Nunavut Tunngavik told BBC News. In denouncing a potential ban, Eetoolook’s group cited their own research study, released earlier this year and conducted in the western side of Hudson Bay, which found the local polar bear population numbered around 1,000 animals and was possibly expanding. “This is not about climate change. This is about how polar bears were used to draw attention to climate change. It was dangerous and wrong for scientists to use incomplete data to make predictions,” Eetoolook said back in April when the study was released.

U.S. proposes ban on polar bear trade

Amanda Graham — Fri, 12 Oct 2012 18:46:10 GMT

(CBC North, 5 October 2012) -- The United States is again lobbying for an international ban on the trade of polar bear parts, after a previous attempt failed in 2010. Officials have submitted a proposal to reclassify the animals under Appendix I — as a species threatened with extinction — of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species or CITES. That would shut down the commercial trade of hides, teeth and claws. It would also effectively shut down international polar bear sport hunts. This is the second time the U.S. has tried to get a ban on the international trade of polar bear parts. In 2010, the first American proposal was defeated at a meeting in Qatar. Nunavut Tunngavik, the Nunavut land claims organization, is outraged by the move. "The polar bear population is very healthy right now and traditional knowledge says that the numbers are increasing,” said NTI vice-president James Eeteelook. Canada is home to about two-thirds of the world’s 20,000 to 25,000 polar bears. Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami president Terry Audla said he was disappointed by the American proposal.

Bald eagle spotted in community in Canada's eastern Arctic

Amanda Graham — Tue, 08 May 2012 00:09:58 GMT

(CBC News via Eye on the Arctic, 7 May 2012) -- Whale Cove, a small predominantly Inuit community in Canada's eastern Arctic territory of Nunavut, is being ruffled by the rare sighting of a bald eagle. Elder Sam Arualak, who has spent most of his life in Whale Cove, said bald eagles are not common to the area. "No, not at all, you don't see them around here," he said in Inuktitut, the Inuit language dialect spoken in the community. "I think they usually belong along the treeline. It is rare to see them in Nunavut." According to residents, the large bird of prey has been feeding in the community of about 400 people along the western coast of Hudson Bay. An Environment Canada spokesperson confirmed the bird is a bald eagle and that it is outside its normal range. Mary-Jones Kriterdluk said the eagle's arrival has caused some excitement. She added it was the biggest bird she had ever seen and that many people were taking photos of it. "It is huge," she said in Inuktitut.

Halibut pierced with mysterious ’projectile parasite’

Amanda Graham — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 17:57:24 GMT

(ScienceNordic, 7 April 2012) -- The halibut is a popular delicacy among seafood lovers. But perhaps the pretty slices and the fine texture of this fish shouldn’t be taken for granted in the future. During filleting work, Greenlandic fishermen recently noticed that a specimen of Greenland halibut was full of strange cavities and holes that resemble shot wounds. The mysteriously infected fish was sent to the Laboratory of Aquatic Pathobiology at the University of Copenhagen, where researchers examined the holes in detail. They discovered that the Greenland halibut had been infected with a hitherto unknown parasite, which creates circular holes in the fish muscle. “At first glance it was impossible to see why the holes had appeared,” says Professor Kurt Buchmann, of the Laboratory of Aquatic Pathobiology at the Department of Veterinary Pathobiology at the University of Copenhagen, who headed the study. “But when I took a closer look through a microscope, I could see that the holes actually consisted of cartilage containing millions of tiny parasites of a previously unknown type. According to the professor, the holes emerged as a result of the parasites attacking cartilage elements in the fish’s skeleton. The cartilage reacts to the infection by swelling dramatically and transforming into long, circular cylinders that go straight through the fish’s musculature and make it appear riddled. ... The parasite has not been described before, neither by fish researchers nor parasite researchers. But its shape reveals that it is of the type Myxobulus – a parasite that’s characterised by being very small and rounded. Since Myxobulus hasn’t previously been observed in the halibut, the researchers knew they were dealing with a new species within Myxobulus. “Detailed DNA analyses also revealed that the newly-discovered projectile parasite was not present in the gene bank for parasites. Moreover, it differed greatly from other known types of parasites.” Although the projectile parasite has hitherto been completely unknown, it is not a newcomer. ”It has probably existed for millions of years – it’s just not been discovered by scientists until now.” Although the parasite makes the delicate fish flesh appear a bit less appetising, Buchmann stresses that it poses no threats to humans.

UNESCO supports Yakutia's Arctic projects

Amanda Graham — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 23:08:25 GMT

(Voice of Russia, 28 March 2012) -- The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has endorsed projects for a permafrost seedbank in Yakutia and research into the impact of global climate change on Arctic nature in that part of Siberia. Developed by local specialists and presented at the UNESCO Paris headquarters earlier this week, the projects will be part of the UNESCO-sponsored global warming assessment monitoring. Here is what Chairman of Yakutia’s Innovative Policy Committee Dmitry Safonov told reporters: "The UNESCO is preparing a large-scale program it plans to launch in 2013. It will focus on climate change and related scientific aspects such as the degradation of permafrost, the productivity of biosystems and the environmental and even humanitarian components, in other words, the effects of climate change on society, on people inhabiting certain territories." The Arctic is a region where climate change has been the most dramatic, which can best be seen in Yakutia. Degrading permafrost causes a rapid decrease of landmass. A research station will be built on the island of Samoilovsky in the Lena delta, where complex studies in various fields will be carried out, said Dmitry Safonov: "These include natural processes, nature management in the Arctic and the dynamics of the coastal and deep-sea permafrost in the eastern Arctic. In the geological bloc, it’s seismotectonics and paleogeography of Arctic Siberia. And there will also be a humanitarian bloc studying of the cultural and historical heritage. The Arctic boasts many interesting sites telling of famous explorers and expeditions of the great Arctic exploration era." Unlike most of the existing world seedbanks, the future cryo-repository in Yakut permafrost won’t need refrigerators to maintain temperatures at the required level, nor will it need electricity to power the equipment. Even compared to the European Union cryo-repository built on Spitsbergen in natural conditions, it will have significant advantages, says Professor of the Novosibirsk Institute of Cytology and Genetics Nikolai Goncharov. "If temperatures rise 5 degrees, the ice on Spitsbergen will melt and the EU cryo-repository will have to use refrigerators. For this to happen in Yakutia, a 20 degree warming is needed. The thick layer of permafrost is an eternal and ecologically clean system resistant to cataclysms."

Murmansk establishes new national park

Amanda Graham — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 04:06:44 GMT

(Atle Staalesen/BarentsObserver, 23 March 2012) -- The establishment of a national park is a first step of a comprehensive plan to protect the Khibiny mountains, a regional official says. According to Aleksey Smirnov, the territories of a so-called nature park will be defined in the course of 2012. Later, the area will be turned into a national park, the representative of the regional Duma Committee on Industrial Development and Environment says. The status as national park will facilitate the efficient protection of the Khibiny eco-system, Smirnov maintains. As previously reported, the Khibiny mountains are part of the federal protection plans of the Ministry of Natural Resources until year 2020. The establishment of the Khibiny natural park is a key component in the regional nature protection plan, which was adopted in December 2011. The park is to be fully established by 2015, Rossiiskaya Gazeta reports. The Khibiny mountains are under increasing pressure both from expanding industrial activities and tourism. While big industrial companies with great appetite look at the hugely rich metal and mineral reserves of the area, the tourism industry attract increasing number of tourists.

Increase in Arctic shipping poses risk to marine mammals

Amanda Graham — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 05:27:08 GMT

(Wildlife Conservation Society press release ᔥ redOrbit, 19 March 2012) -- A rapid increase in shipping in the formerly ice-choked waterways of the Arctic poses a significant increase in risk to the region’s marine mammals and the local communities that rely on them for food security and cultural identity, according to an Alaska Native groups and the Wildlife Conservation Society who convened at a recent workshop. The workshop—which ran from March 12-14—examined the potential impacts to the region’s wildlife and highlighted priorities for future management of shipping in the region. The meeting included participants from the Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission, Eskimo Walrus Commission, Alaska Beluga Whale Committee, Ice Seal Committee, Indigenous People’s Council for Marine Mammals, and the Inuit Circumpolar Council. Other participants included the University of Alaska, government agencies such as the U.S. Coast Guard, Arctic Research Commission, and the Marine Mammal Commission, and regional Alaska Native groups such as Kawerak Inc., North Slope Borough, Northwest Alaska Borough, and Association of Village Council Presidents. At issue is the effect of climate change on Arctic waters, which over the last few decades have become increasingly ice-free during the summer and fall. The lengthening of the open-water season has led to new industrial developments, including oil and gas activities and a rising number of large maritime vessels transiting either the Northern Sea Route over the Russian Arctic from Europe, or the Northwest Passage through the Canadian Arctic from the Atlantic. Whichever route is being used, the only gateway to the Pacific is through the Bering Strait—an important migratory pathway for marine mammals.

First ever caribou count on Baffin Island begins

Amanda Graham — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 23:59:08 GMT

(CBC News, 16 March 2012) -- A major project is about to begin to count caribou on Baffin Island for the first time ever. Last minute logistics are still being worked out in an Iqaluit hotel room which is serving as a operations base. Baffin regional biologist Debbie Jenkins is leading the survey. "So this really is going to provide critical, fundamental, baseline information on this population or populations,” Jenkins said. “We think there's actually 3 different populations of barrengound caribou on the island" Helicopters will fly at low levels over the entire island, to try to get the most accurate count possible. The data could determine conservation measures, or restrict development in some areas. Local communities are involved with the survey in the hope it helps their hunters. Noah Mosesee is the chair of Pangnirtung's Hunters and Trappers organization. “We support the survey and are looking forward to working together with DFO's and wildlife department to find out how many caribou and the location where they have migrated to,” Mosesee said. “This is very important to us.” The helicopters are set to take off from Iqaluit as soon as the weather allows. They'll focus on South Baffin this year and North Baffin next year.

Samples from Syrian seed bank sheltered in Arctic doomsday vault

Amanda Graham — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 06:36:17 GMT

(AP via Washington Post, 27 February 2012) -- STOCKHOLM - Chick peas, fava beans and other seeds from a facility in Syria are among the 25,000 new samples being deposited this week in an Arctic seed vault built to protect food crops from wars and natural disasters, officials said Tuesday. The latest additions mean that the Svalbard Global Seed Vault — a master backup to the world’s other seed banks — has now secured more than 740,000 samples since it opened in a remote Norwegian archipelago in 2008. That represents an estimated three-quarters of the biological diversity of the world’s major food crops, said Cary Fowler, executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, which maintains the vault with Norway’s government and the Nordic Genetic Resources Center. With the shipment from the Syria-based International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas, almost its entire collection is now backed up in Svalbard, Fowler told The Associated Press. “I think the events unfolding in Syria obviously underline the importance of having safety duplication outside of a country,” he said, adding the facility had not been damaged in the military crackdown on an anti-government uprising. He noted that wars destroyed seed banks in Iraq and Afghanistan. Another one in Egypt was looted during last year’s uprising. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault — sometimes referred to as a doomsday vault — is designed to withstand global warming, earthquakes and even nuclear strikes.

Canada's Southampton Island caribou at risk of being wiped out

Amanda Graham — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 07:41:02 GMT

(CBC News via Eye on the Arctic, 27 January 2012) -- The caribou herd on Southampton Island, which was once wiped out in the 1950s, may face extinction once again. Mitch Campbell, a wildlife biologist with the Government of Nunavut, a territory in Canada's eastern Arctic, says disease and overhunting are threatening the herd on the island at the mouth of Hudson Bay. He said a reproductive disease called brucellosis infected the island herd in 2000. As a result, pregnancy rates have dropped to about 30 per cent from 80 per cent, he said. Now social media like Facebook and cheap shipping rates from the airlines for country food are helping people in Nunavut communities like Iqaluit, where caribou is scarce, order meat from hunters in the Southhampton Island Inuit community of Coral Harbour, putting more stress on the herd. The herd on Southampton Island was hunted to extinction in the 1950s, and was re-established when 50 animals were transplanted there in 1968. "They've gone down from a high of 30,000 in 1997 to what we surveyed this last June which was about 7,500 animals," said Campbell. Campbell said more than 1,500 caribou had been exported this winter, which is higher than the birth rate, and that is only halfway through the season. "We believe that if this isn't stopped, this is an unsustainable harvest and probably will cause the population to be devastated within the next three years or so," he said. "One of the only ways that we will be able to control the harvest is by applying a total allowable harvest." Campbell said efforts to meet with the Coral Harbour Hunters and Trappers Organization have been unsuccessful. No one from the organization was available to speak with CBC.

Eider duck population declining in Arctic as polar bears devour eggs

Amanda Graham — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 01:30:40 GMT

(Anita Li/Toronto Star, 25 January 2012) -- An Arctic duck is at risk because polar bears have developed a newfound appetite for their eggs, scientists say. The eider populations in Nunavut and Nunavik, Que., are declining partly because the bears have been eating more of their eggs, which are laid on the southern coasts of Baffin Island and Southampton Island. “The bears were essentially eating every single egg on the island(s),” said Samuel Iverson, a field researcher with Environment Canada. “We are seeing just major nest depredation.” Over the past three decades, climate change has caused sea ice to disappear, making it more difficult for polar bears to hunt for seals, their primary prey. To compensate, the bears have been raiding eider nests for food. “These bears might be energy-deficient and more willing to consume resources, which before, weren’t very important to them, but now are piquing the bears’ interest in a way that they haven’t in the past,” he said. “The number of colonies where we saw this happening was much higher than anybody has ever recorded before.” But eating a diet of eggs isn’t enough to sustain the polar bear population in the long-term, Iverson added.

Russian Arctic to be made tourist attraction

Amanda Graham — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 20:50:24 GMT

(TASS via Voice of Russia, 20 January 2012) -- A tourist zone will be created on the premises of the Russian Arctic National Park in the north of the Novaya Zemlya Archipelago and on the islands of Franz Josef Land. According to local officials, the construction of helicopter pads and harbors to receive cruise vessels will begin this summer. Former polar stations and deserted military bases will be transformed into tourist centers and virgin territories will be open only for research. The Russian Arctic, the northernmost nature reserve in Eurasia, is home to the biggest colonies of birds and rookeries in the Northern Hemisphere. It is populated by polar bears, Greenland whales, white seagulls and other Red Book species.

Polar bears turn cannibalistic as climate change depletes arctic food supply

Amanda Graham — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 17:17:24 GMT

(Rheana Murray / New York Daily News, 11 January 2012) -- Dwindling Arctic Sea ice is cutting off polar bears’ food supply, forcing the starving animals to devour their own kind. While cannibalism among polar bears isn’t unheard of, experts say the behavior is becoming increasingly common. “There are increasing numbers of observations of it occurring,” photojournalist Jenny Ross told BBC News. “Particularly on land where polar bears are trapped ashore, completely food-deprived for extended periods of time due to the loss of sea ice as a result of climate change.” Ross explained how the higher temperatures melt ice more quickly, leaving the bears less time to fuel up on ice-dependent seals, the animals’ main source of food. “Weights of adults are decreasing, litters are smaller, fewer young bears are surviving, and the overall population size is shrinking,” she said. Ross, whose research was published in the January 2012 edition of <e>Ocean Geographic Magazine</e>, described watching a bear guard its kill, a cub. “As soon as the adult male became aware that a boat was approaching him, he basically stood to my attention — he straddled the young bear’s body, asserting control over it and conveying ‘this is my food,’” she recalled to BBC News. “He then picked up the bear in his jaws and, just using the power of his jaws and his neck, transported it from one floe to another. “And eventually, when he was a considerable distance away, he stopped and fed on the carcass.” See the entire article here.

Lack of sea ice could be causing more seal deaths, say researchers

Amanda Graham — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 18:23:32 GMT

(Canadian Press via CTV, 4 January 2012) -- HALIFAX - A new scientific study suggests harp seals in the North Atlantic are dying at high rates because of warming waters and a steady decline of sea ice in their traditional breeding grounds. The research by scientists at Duke University in North Carolina tracked the decrease of sea ice due to global warming and the mortality of harp seals from 1992 to 2010. David Johnston, a marine scientist who co-wrote the report, said it's the first study to show that seasonal ice cover in the four seal breeding areas of North America has receded by as much as six per cent per decade. "There has been a string of light ice years recently and we're starting to be concerned that if ice continues to decline, this might have longer-term effects on the harp seal population," Johnston said from his office in Beaufort, N.C. "I'm concerned that these animals are in for a tough road with what we're seeing with climate change." The authors warned that they could see the disappearance of a year's entire seal pup herd due to a lack of ice, where females traditionally go to give birth every February and March. Pups usually drown if born in the water or on thin, unstable ice. The study was funded by the International Fund for Animal Welfare, which has lobbied against the annual Canadian seal hunt. Johnston said the participation of the animal-rights group didn't affect the objectivity of the report, which was peer-reviewed.

Scientists still unsure what's causing Arctic Alaska ringed seals to die

Amanda Graham — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 21:26:13 GMT

(Alex de Marban/Alaska Dispatch, 20 December 2011) -- A federal agency said Tuesday that tests indicate a virus did not cause the deaths or illnesses of more than 100 Arctic Alaska ringed seals found with skin sores, ulcers on internal organs, patchy hair loss and other symptoms. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists announced via press release that despite numerous tests, it still does not know what's causing the illness. Deaths in the Arctic and Bering Strait region of Alaska have been declared an unusual mortality event, a status that provides additional resources to investigate the cause, including access to more expertise and a contingency fund, the agency said. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is considering making a similar declaration for Pacific walrus in Alaska. "Since mid-July, more than 60 dead and 75 diseased seals, most of them ringed seals, have been reported in Alaska, with reports continuing to come in," the NOAA press release said. "During their fall survey, scientists with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also identified diseased and dead walruses at the annual mass haul-out at Point Lay (in Northwest Alaska)." The disease has caused skin ulcers that usually appear on the animals' hind flippers or face. Some of the sick animals have had difficulty breathing and appear lethargic. Also, some necropsies have revealed "fluid in the lungs, white spots on the liver, and abnormal brain growths." Scientists suspect that those internal wounds may be caused by bacteria entering the animals' bodies through the ulcers, said Stephen Raverty, a veterinary pathologist and working group member of the Provincial Veterinary Diagnostic Lab in British Columbia. Testing continues for causes related to "immune system-related diseases, fungi, man-made and bio-toxins, radiation exposure, contaminants, and stressors related to sea ice change," the agency reported.

Will Russian icebreaker make it in time to save 100 whales trapped in Arctic ice?

Amanda Graham — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 22:00:01 GMT

(Mia Bennett/Eye on the Arctic via Alaska Dispatch, 15 December 2011) -- Off the east coast of the Russian Chukotka peninsula, winter has come hard and fast, freezing parts of the Bering Strait. Fifteen miles south of the village of Yanrakynnot in the Sinyavinsky Strait, 100 beluga whales are trapped in the ice. Hunters have reported that they are in two polynyas and are currently able to breathe freely. However, food and clean water will soon run out, and the whales will likely die of exhaustion or starvation if the ice is not soon broken up. Roman Kopin, governor of Chukotka, has written letters to the Ministry of Transport and the Ministry of Emergency Situations requesting an icebreaker to aid the beluga whales. He suggested the marine rescue boat Ruby as a possible source of salvation for the whales. The icebreaker is a couple of days away, busy helping the Korean cargo ship Oriental Angel, which has run aground on the Gulf of Anadyr. All of its 90 crew members managed to escape on inflatable boats, but there are still 1,100 gallons of flammable liquid onboard the ship. Meanwhile, Chukotka authorities are busy trying to find out how far away the nearest source of clean water is from the whales.

Arctic refuge's 'ANWR' tag rankles conservationists

Amanda Graham — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 20:34:15 GMT

(Phil Taylor/Environment and Energy Publishing, 22 November 2011) -- First comes the abbreviation. Then comes the drilling. That's the fear of environmental groups fighting to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil and gas drilling and the reason they are quietly waging a battle over how the 19-million-acre area is branded to the public. As the House moves closer to passing a bill that would open a portion of the refuge's coastal plain to drilling, environmentalists and their Democratic allies warn the term "ANWR" fails to convey a place rich in wildlife, cultural values and wilderness. "ANWR" -- pronounced ANN-warr -- connotes a landscape of mineral wealth ripe for development, some refuge advocates argue. Groups also oppose calling the refuge's 1.6-million-acre coastal plain the "1002 area," a nickname that came from Section 10, Paragraph 2 of the 1980 bill that named the refuge and drew its modern boundaries. "It's the bane of my existence," said Emilie Surrusco, communications director for the Alaska Wilderness League, a Washington, D.C.-based group that is fighting plans to drill in the refuge and offshore in the Arctic Ocean. ... An aide to Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who has sponsored a bill to designate the coastal plain as wilderness, corrects reporters who use the acronym over the phone. Conservationists, too, have excused themselves when accidentally using the term in front of like-minded peers. Even lawmakers who oppose drilling in the refuge continue to sometimes call it by its acronym, said Cindy Shogan, executive director at the wilderness league. "We've definitely failed in convincing members to not call it ANWR," she said. "ANWR is what the oil industry wants you to think of it." ... Doug Brinkley, a historian from Rice University, also accused the oil lobby Friday of using the acronym to win public support for drilling. "Do you want to drill ANWR? Yes," he told the House Natural Resources Committee at a hearing titled "ANWR: Jobs, Energy and Deficit Reduction." "Do you want to molest [President] Eisenhower's great wildlife reserve? No." But while major oil companies did lobby on ANWR in the 1990s, companies began pulling out of the debate at least 10 years ago when the issue started becoming politically caustic, said Adrian Herrera, who manages Arctic Power, an Anchorage-based lobbying firm with a Washington office funded primarily by the state of Alaska.

Ptarmigan population down

Amanda Graham — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 22:21:57 GMT

(CBC News, 11 November 2011) -- Ptarmigan populations could be in trouble in Yukon. The population cycle of the birds in the territory has so far been predictable, but Yukon biologist Dave Mossop says it looks like the last cycle didn't happen. "The 10-year cycle that's followed by all of the grouse, including ptarmigan, as well as hares and some others, their predators, has been tracked for well over 100 years in North America and it looks like this last cycle basically didn't happen,” said Mossop. “It doesn't look like things are going extinct. It's just that we lost that peak and it could be very troubling." Mossop says scientists don't know what's causing the change, but he says they're seeing it across a large area of the North.

Arctic sea ice 'to melt by 2015'

Amanda Graham — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 18:49:51 GMT

(Nick Collins/Telegraph, 8 November 2011) -- Prof Peter Wadhams, of Cambridge University, said the ice that forms over the Arctic sea is shrinking so rapidly that it could vanish altogether in as little as four years' time. Although it would reappear again every winter, its absence during the peak of summer would rob polar bears of their summer hunting ground and threaten them with extinction. The mass of ice between northern Russia, Canada and Greenland waxes and wanes with the seasons, currently reaching a minimum size of about four million square kilometres. Most models, including the latest estimates by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), track the decline in the area covered by ice in recent years to predict the rate at which it will deteriorate. But citing research compiled by Dr Wieslaw Maslowski, a researcher from the American Naval Postgraduate School, last year Prof Wadhams said such predictions failed to spot how quickly climate change is causing the ice to thin. While the IPCC suggests the ice will remain in place until the 2030s, Dr Maslowski's study also takes into account the rate at which it is thinning and calculates that it will vanish much more quickly. Dr Maslowski's model, along with his claim that the Arctic sea ice is in a "death spiral", were controversial but Prof Wadhams, a leading authority on the polar regions, said the calculations had him "pretty much persuaded." Prof Wadhams said: "His [model] is the most extreme but he is also the best modeller around. "It is really showing the fall-off in ice volume is so fast that it is going to bring us to zero very quickly. 2015 is a very serious prediction and I think I am pretty much persuaded that that's when it will happen."

For Inuits dealing with climate change, science can be slow and bumbling

Amanda Graham — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 17:05:13 GMT

(Carol Berry/Indian Country, 25 October 2011) -- An Inuk woman practicing a traditional craft finds the sealskin she’s working with doesn’t have the nice fur of times past and it has rotten patches that tear easily. Her husband finds that hunting seals is more difficult than in the past because the formerly stable edge of an ice-floe has broken off and fewer seals are there. He carries a gun as protection against increasing numbers of polar bears. They are among Native people in the circumpolar North who experience climate change in their everyday lives and for whom conventional science, despite its ability to describe the change, sometimes has been unhelpful. One Inuk hunter accuses wildlife biologists of “meddling [that] is causing problems” by putting radio collars on bears so they “can’t hunt properly” or using helicopters that destroy animals’ hearing. Carcasses of over-drugged bears have been found, he says, and wildlife policies “make our lives difficult” even though “we know our wildlife intimately.” His and others’ experiences are told in Qapirangajuq: Inuit Knowledge and Climate Change, the last film in the Eighth Annual Indigenous Film & Arts Festival, presented Oct. 12-16 by the International Institute for Indigenous Resource Management (IIIRM), Denver. The festival’s theme was “Adaptation: Finding Balance in a Changing World.” Mervyn Tano, IIIRM president, said both ground-level science and science policy are needed to “cut through some of the conventional wisdom” to discern, for example, what the role should be of wildlife biologists crafting wildlife regulations. Government inflexibility in wildlife rules is difficult to change, one scientist found after doing research in the remote northwest interior of Alaska. Shannon McNeeley, with the Integrated Science Program, National Center for Atmospheric Research, conducted a post-film panel with Tano and talked about changes in moose behavior patterns with climate change. ... That change is indeed occurring is documented by the film’s co-director, Zacharias Kunuk, who interviewed elders on Baffin Island, located in the eastern part of Nunavut in the Canadian polar North. Environmental change “is dangerous to people worldwide—it affects both Inuit and Southerners,” said Mary Simon, Inuk, Canada’s first Ambassador for Circumpolar Affairs. “These big money-makers in the world are all contributors to climate change.”

Mysterious outbreak killing Arctic Alaska ringed seals

Amanda Graham — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 18:12:30 GMT

(Alex DeMarban/Alaska Dispatch, 13 October 2011) -- A mysterious and potentially widespread disease is thought to have contributed to the deaths of dozens of ringed seals along Alaska's Arctic coast. Scores more are sickened, some so ill that skin lesions bleed when touched. The animals are an important subsistence food for Alaska Native hunters and their families, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has proposed listing them as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act. In July, biologists with the North Slope Borough's Department of Wildlife Management began receiving reports of ringed seals hauled out on beaches, an unusual behavior since the animals usually prefer the water or ice. Since then, they've found at least 100 seals with telltale mangy hair and skin lesions, mostly while traveling by four-wheeler along 30 miles of Beaufort and Chukchi sea coastline outside Barrow. At least 46 of those seals have been found dead, and experts aren't sure if the disease is killing them or if other infections and polar bears are proving fatal once the seals become feeble. "Right now we're leaning toward it being a virus, and that could weaken their immune system," said Jason Herreman, a borough wildlife biologist studying seals and polar bears. The Department of Wildlife Management has never documented a similar outbreak in the North Slope region, Herreman said. Scientists don't know the scope of the problem because since ringed seals are difficult to track and haven't been counted for decades. Hundreds of thousands are thought to live in the region.

Federal agency tries to write polar bear recovery plan

Amanda Graham — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 21:42:41 GMT

(Dan Joling/Anchorage Daily News, 29 August 2011) -- In a windowless convention center room more than a thousand miles from polar bears roaming on sea ice, marine mammal biologists gathered last week in Anchorage to work on a recovery plan for the Arctic Ocean's most famous fauna.The Interior Department three years ago listed polar bears as threatened because of the alarming rate at which sea ice, their primary habitat, is projected to disappear each summer. In the same announcement, then-Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said endangered species law would not be used to set climate policy or limit greenhouse gas emissions, a rule affirmed by the Obama administration. The determination that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will not be allowed to address the culprit for warming -- greenhouse gases emitted worldwide -- means the recovery plan will be like no other since the Endangered Species Act was signed by President Nixon 38 years ago. "The best we can do is work with our domestic and international partners to address symptoms of climate change," said wildlife biologist James Wilder, who heads the recovery plan effort, on Thursday. ... Rosa Meehan, the USFWS marine mammals manager in Alaska, said recovery plans traditionally have dealt with a very specific threat that causes habitat loss. "We don't have that," she said. "We're dealing with a projected change and it's not a directed feature, it's this climate change that all of us ... is in some way contributing to." Figuring out how much greenhouse gas melts what amount of ice, and how that equates to an effect on a particular bear, would require near impossible connections, she said. "At the end of the day, you can't say, 'Well, someone driving an SUV down in California on the highways is going to make polar bear cub 'A' live two years less," Meehan said. "There's just too many huge steps in there to make those direct connections." So instead, wildlife managers are focusing on what they can control, such as assessing the condition of polar bear populations through habitat and demographic reviews, which present their own challenges.

Federal polar bear scientist back on the job

Amanda Graham — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 05:44:21 GMT

(Kim Murphy/Los Angeles Times, 26 August 2011) -- The arcane world of polar bear research was rocked recently by the suspension of a federal scientist in Alaska whose research on polar bear drownings in the Arctic raised major concerns about climate change. But the researcher was reinstated to his job Friday — and an inquiry has been launched to determine whether the Obama administration tried to interfere with his research. The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement confirmed that Charles Monnett — whose suspension in July sparked an outcry among fellow scientists, climate change researchers and opponents of offshore oil and gas drilling — has been recalled from six weeks of administrative leave. But he won't be resuming his previous work managing research contracts, the bureau said. Agency officials have sought to downplay the incident, saying Monnett was suspended for improperly administering contracts, not for documenting dead polar bears. "There is no truth to any suggestion that the return to work is in any way tied to … allegations against bureau leadership," said Melissa Schwartz, a spokeswoman for the bureau, which oversees oil and gas development in many of the same Arctic regions where polar bears are seeing their icy habitat shrink.

Caribou populations back from the brink

Amanda Graham — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 22:54:19 GMT

(CBC News, 22 August 2011) -- Two years ago scientists feared northern caribou were the new cod — once-teeming stocks of wildlife that had sustained entire cultures but were at the edge of collapse. Now, as scientists from around the world gather in Yellowknife to compare notes, biologists are beginning to see signs that the worst is past for an animal so central to the Canadian imagination it's on the back of the quarter. "Our situation overall is looking a lot brighter than it did two years ago," said Jan Adamczewski, a biologist with the government of the Northwest Territories. "Those of us concerned with management of these caribou herds are breathing just a little bit easier." About 230 scientists from around the circumpolar world are meeting this week at a conference held once every four years on Arctic ungulates. They'll talk about muskox and reindeer, too, but the recent changes in caribou are sure to be a large part of the agenda. In 2009, nine of Canada's 11 northern herds were considered to be in decline. Biologists estimated the Bathurst population on the central barrens had fallen to 32,000 from more than 120,000 in 2006. That was a 75 per cent implosion, a loss of nearly 90,000 animals in only three years. But since then both the Cape Bathurst and Bluenose East herds have stabilized. The Bluenose East herd is back up over 100,000 animals. Yukon's Porcupine herd is approaching 1980s levels. And preliminary surveys in 2010 and 2011 of the Bathurst herd hint the free fall may have bottomed out. "It kind of looks like maybe we've turned the corner there," said Adamczewski. "There's a very slight indication that the herd may be starting to increase."

Melting Arctic sea ice drives walruses onto land

Amanda Graham — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 14:22:45 GMT

(ENN, 23 August 2011) -- Fast-melting Arctic sea ice appears to be pushing walruses to haul themselves out onto land, and many are moving around the area where oil leases have been sold, the U.S. Geological Survey reports. Walruses are accomplished divers and frequently plunge hundreds of feet (meters) to the bottom of the continental shelf to feed. But they use sea ice as platforms to give birth, nurse their young and elude predators, and when sea ice is scarce or non-existent, as it has been this summer, they come up on land. Last September, the loss of sea ice caused an estimated 10,000 to 20,000 walruses to venture onto land, and as sea ice melts reached a record last month, U.S. government scientists are working with Alaskan villagers to put radio transmitters on some of the hauled-out walruses to track their movements around the Chukchi Sea. "The ice is very widely dispersed and there is little of it left over the continental shelf," researcher Chad Jay of the U.S. Geological Survey said in a statement on Wednesday. "Based on our tracking data, the walruses appear to be spreading out and spending quite a bit of time looking for sea ice." The loss of sea ice puts Pacific walruses at risk, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, but other, higher-priority species will get attention first. In February, the wildlife service listed Pacific walruses as candidates for protection, though not protection itself.

Arctic Wildlife Refuge squeezed between developers, tourists

Amanda Graham — Sun, 21 Aug 2011 16:21:52 GMT

(ENS, 15 August 2011) -- ANCHORAGE, Alaska - The designation of Wild and Scenic Rivers and a new National Wilderness Area are central to a new 15-year draft conservation management plan for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Friday. The Obama administration's plan comes as the State of Alaska is preparing to open millions of acres of state-owned arctic lands on the western border of the refuge to an oil and gas lease sale. The Fish and Wildlife Service's draft Comprehensive Conservation Plan and Environmental Impact Statement contains six alternatives for long-term management. One alternative recommends that Congress designate the Hulahula, Kongakut, and Marsh Fork Canning rivers as Wild and Scenic Rivers. ... But, the plan says, refuge staff have received visitor reports of group crowding at boat launches; user conflicts; excessive over-flights; fire rings, tent rings, and human waste accumulations at concentrated access points and popular camp areas; hardening or impairment of fragile riparian and tundra habitats; and increased footprint of aircraft landing areas. or further protection, the Service is considering designating three areas, including the Arctic Refuge coastal plain and the Brooks Range of mountains, for inclusion within the National Wilderness Preservation System. None of the proposals under consideration would change existing protocols for subsistence harvest. To get public opinion on the six options, the agency is conducting a series of public meetings and reviewing public comments before finalizing the plan, which will ultimately identify a preferred alternative.

Polar bear kills British teen in Arctic expedition

Amanda Graham — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 00:35:52 GMT

(Fox News, 5 August 2011) -- VON POSTBREEN, Norway - A polar bear attacked a group of British students camping on a remote Arctic glacier as part of a high-end adventure holiday, killing a 17-year-old boy and injuring four other young people Friday before a trip member fatally shot the bear. Two were hospitalized with severe injuries, according to the British Schools Exploring Society, the organizer of the trip. The attack took place on the Svalbard archipelago, which is home to about 2,400 people and 3,000 polar bears and attracts well-off and hardy tourists with stunning views of snow-covered mountains, fjords and glaciers. The British Schools Exploring Society is affiliated with Britain's Royal Geographic Society and has run expeditions for young people to remote and challenging corners of the globe for at least 75 years. Expedition members were spending three to five weeks in the Arctic, and had each paid 2,000 pounds (US$3,300) to 3,000 pounds (US$4,900) to join the trip, designed to mix science experiments with adventure. Participants were hunting for Arctic fossils and taking part in environmental experiments, including a project to install hydro and solar power systems. The group also was clearing beaches of tidal debris. On Friday morning, some of the youths were camping on Spitsbergen Island, the largest in the Svalbard archipelago, and a place where researchers say there is not much food available for polar bears during the summer. The bear attacked a group of 13 people in the early morning, leaving them with moderate to severe wounds that included head injuries, officials said. One of the campers shot the bear, said Liv Asta Oedegaard, a spokeswoman for the Svalbard governor's office. The injured were evacuated by helicopter to Tromsoe, the nearest city on the Norwegian mainland. "With great sadness the British Schools Exploring Society confirms the tragic death this morning of one of the members of its expedition in Svalbard," said Edward Watson, chairman of the British Schools Exploring Society. He named the teen as Horatio Chapple, who hoped to study medicine.

Polar bear cubs face death as Arctic ice melts

Amanda Graham — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 23:10:36 GMT

(WWF Statement via RedOrbit, 20 July 2011) -- As their icy Arctic habitat melts, polar bear mothers and their cubs are forced to swim long distances, which expose the cubs to higher mortality rates than cubs who do not have to swim as far, a study shows. “Climate change is pulling the sea ice out from under polar bears’ feet, forcing some to swim longer distances to find food and habitat,” co-author of the study, Geoff York of World Wildlife Fund (WWF), told Reuters. Polar bears are not naturally aquatic creatures. They rely on ice or land to hunt, feed and give birth, reports Reuters. Previous studies found that individual animals have had to swim hundreds of miles to reach ice platforms or land, but this is the first to show how these long swims expose polar bear cubs to greater risks. According to York, the current study is the first time these long swims have been quantitatively measured. Researchers used satellites to track 68 polar bear females equipped with GPS collars over a six year span, from 2004 to 2009. Data was gathered to find occasions when these bears swam for more than 30 miles at a time. Over those six years, there were 50 long-distance swims involving 20 bears, ranging up to 426 miles in distance, and with duration of about 12.7 days, according to the study presented at the International Bear Association Conference in Ottawa, Canada this week. At the start of the study when the bears were equipped with the GPS collars, 11 of the bears that swam long distances had young cubs. Five of the polar bear mothers lost their babies during the long swim, which represents a 45% mortality rate, report the study. For cubs that didn’t have to swim long distances with their mothers, the mortality rate was 18%.

Whale census: Bowhead spottings near all-time high

Amanda Graham — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 06:10:04 GMT

(Jake Neher/ The Arctic Sounder, 16 July 2011) -- Biologist Craig George has an unusual job. He counts whales. It's actually a very complex, dangerous, and important job. Under an international treaty, the United States is a member of the International Whaling Commission (IWC), and must conduct a census every ten years to keep track of the size and trends of the stock of whales being harvested by hunters. That's easier said than done. But after 30 years doing it, George seems to have developed a fairly workable process. It's a three-plus mile snow machine ride out on the sea ice to get to where researchers are busy counting whales. ... As of May 30th, they had spotted nearly 3,400 bowheads. They also possibly saw up to 630 additional whales, but weren't able to determine if they were duplicate sightings. George says that's very close to the all-time record for whales seen in a year. That's good news for researchers, the North Slope Borough, and native whalers, because the census actually failed two years in a row in 2009 and 2010. The last successful count was back in 2001. In addition to the ice-based count out on the perches, they teamed up with the National Marine Fisheries Service to successfully pulled-off an aerial photo survey of the bowhead migration this year. They also placed several audio recording devices in the water to get acoustic data of the migration to help calculate missed whale correction factors. George says all these things will make for a better confidence-level in the final survey estimates.

U.S.-Russia commission to meet on Chukchi polar bears

Amanda Graham — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 05:53:12 GMT

(Dan Joling/Anchorage Daily News, 16 July 2011) -- Polar bears in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska's northwest coast face an uncertain future because of the warming climate. A U.S. and Russia commission aims to address short-term threats.The four-person commission, made up of national and Native representatives from each country, will meet for three days in Moscow starting July 27 to discuss subsistence hunting and other issues for the polar bear population shared by the two countries in the waters north and just south of the Bering Strait. The commission last year set a harvest limit of 58 split between the two sides. A main topic for the meeting will be how each side will make that work, said Eric Regehr, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife service biologist who serves on the commission's science advisory board. U.S. commissioners will present a draft harvest management plan proposed to begin the quota Jan. 1, 2013. The commission was created by a treaty signed in 2000 and is significant for representing co-management across countries and cultures, said Rosa Meehan, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's marine mammals manager in Alaska. "It's the first effort in Russia that formally recognizes the Native people of Russia and involves them in a governmental process," she said.

Ancestry of polar bears traced to Ireland

Amanda Graham — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 19:20:17 GMT

(Penn State University press release, 7 July 2011) -- An international team of scientists has discovered that the female ancestor of all living polar bears was a brown bear that lived in the vicinity of present-day Britain and Ireland just prior to the peak of the last ice age, 20,000 to 50,000 years ago. Beth Shapiro, the Shaffer associate professor of biology at Penn State and one of the team's leaders, explained that climate changes affecting the North Atlantic ice sheet probably gave rise to periodic overlaps in bear habitats. These overlaps then led to hybridization, or interbreeding -- an event that caused maternal DNA from brown bears to be introduced into polar bears. The research, which is led by Penn State's Shapiro and Daniel Bradley of Trinity College Dublin, is expected to help guide future conservation efforts for polar bears, which are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. The results of the study were published on July 7 in the journal Current Biology. Polar and brown bears are vastly different species in terms of body size ... and many other physical features. Behaviorally, they are also quite distinct.... "Despite these differences, we know that the two species have interbred ... during the last 100,000 years," Shapiro said. "Most importantly, previous research has indicated that the brown bear contributed genetic material to the polar bear's mitochondrial lineage -- the maternal part of the genome, or the DNA that is passed exclusively from mothers to offspring. But, until now, it was unclear just when modern polar bears acquired their mitochondrial genome in its present form." Although previous researchers had suggested that the ancient female ancestor of modern polar bears lived on the ABC Islands -- the Alaskan islands of Admiralty, Baranof, and Chichagof -- only 14,000 years ago, Shapiro's team found evidence of a much earlier hybridization event. Because of this event, the modern polar bear's mitochondrial DNA probably underwent fixation -- a drastic reduction in genetic variation and a transition to a state in which the entire gene pool includes only one form of a particular gene. After performing genetic analyses of 242 brown-bear and polar-bear mitochondrial lineages sampled throughout the last 120,000 years and across multiple geographic ranges, Shapiro's team found that the fixation of the mitochondrial genome likely occurred during or just before the peak of the last ice age, possibly as early as 50,000 years ago, near present-day Ireland. Shapiro noted that the specific population of brown bears that shared its maternal DNA with polar bears has been extinct for roughly 9,000 years. However, her data offer clear genetic evidence that the two species were in contact long before the brown bear's disappearance from the British Isles.

A century-old green fishery decimated by government interference

Amanda Graham — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 19:17:35 GMT

(Yukon River Gold LLC press release, 12 July 2011) -- KALTAG, ALASKA - Yukon River Gold LLC has announced the suspension of fish buying operations this summer in the remote Alaskan village of Kaltag, pending review for a permanent closure of the facility. This closure results in elimination of 70 jobs this summer, in this remote village of less than 800 people, where jobs are scarce. The closure is the result of inadequate supplies of harvest opportunities to supply the plant with salmon. With record numbers of Keta salmon returning, this plant stands idle while the fish swim by. The primary problem facing Yukon fisheries, is how to separate the abundant Keta salmon, from the Chinook salmon that are needed for conservation. How to harvest one, and not the other? Kaltag’s answer; harvest with fishwheels. Fishwheels are an old technology, that is being rediscovered wherever salmon return, because they are so environmentally friendly. Fishwheels are a revolving series of dip nets powered by the river, hence no energy needed. Fisheries scientists worldwide, utilize this technology to capture and release fish for research purposes. The salmon are carefully captured alive and returned to the river unharmed within seconds; guaranteeing a 100% subsistence priority for Chinook salmon. A perfect solution to the mixed salmon in the Yukon River. ... Kaltag cooperating with Alaskan authorities began using their fishwheels to release the Chinook salmon alive. ... As a consequence of this program, leading global magazine Seafood International has named the tiny Alaskan village of Kaltag, as one of the world’s 11 greenest fisheries. Environmentally sensitive customers lined up to buy the product. Karlberg said “Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADFG) notified us that we would not be able to harvest abundant Keta salmon, until all the Chinook salmon have left the area. These fish travel together, so that marked the end of the fishery for us with nothing to harvest. We pointed out that we had proven to ADFG that over the last two years we could harvest Keta salmon, without killing a single Chinook salmon. We asked; How do you close a fishery that does not kill Chinook salmon, … to save Chinook salmon? We simply do not know what the issue is. ... Historically there have been dozens of salmon processing plants on the Yukon. Last year there were two left. With today’s closure of the Kaltag plant, there is only one plant left standing, and it is struggling to survive. With no processing plants, there can be no fishing. These centuries’ old isolated communities will have been walled off from the very resource that the villages were specifically located to survive upon over centuries. ... Plant manager Doug Karlberg says, “Closing this plant was a painful decision. It simply did not have to happen. This closure was caused by politics, not science. Kaltag is a wonderful community, but it is economically challenged, isolated with a small voting population, and being asked to pay the ultimate price in order to save a species which it does not even harvest.”

Ottawa wants polar bear added to SARA list

Amanda Graham — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 17:24:42 GMT

(Jane George/Nunatsiaq News, 13 July 2011) -- The federal environment department wants to add polar bears to Canada’s list of endangered species. On July 2 an Order of Parliament was filed in the Canada Gazette, asking for an amendment to the Species of Risk Act, which would see polar bears listed as a species “of special concern.” There’s now a 30 day comment period on the amendment. “The proposed Order is an important commitment regarding Polar Bears and their vulnerability,” reads an impact analysis statement on the Order. To gauge public support for the listing of polar bears, Environment Canada carried out public consultations between November 2008 and March 2010. “In the North, the majority of communities contacted were not in favour of listing the Polar Bear,” the impact analysis statement acknowledges. Meetings took place in 23 of 25 Nunavut communities and 793 people attended. Of the 119 comments received, the majority did not support listing the polar bear under SARA. The Nunavut Wildlife Management Board, which, under the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement, can approve the designation of rare, threatened and endangered species in Nunavut, advised the Minister of the Environment that it would not support the proposed listing of the polar bear as a species of special concern. The Nunavik Marine Region Wildlife Board also decided against the listing of the polar bear. And last May, Nunavut’s environment Minister Dan Shewchuk reversed the Government of Nunavut’s previously-held position in favour of listing, following consultation with hunters and elders. Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. has said the listing creates an opening for animal welfare groups to try to influence Canada’s polar bear management. The move to list polar bears comes three years after the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada assessed the polar bear as a species of special concern. Under SARA, the listing of a species as special concern means a management plan must be prepared within three years to prevent the listed species from becoming endangered or threatened.

Iceland’s sea bird stock 'in dismal shape'

Amanda Graham — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 07:15:48 GMT

(IceNews, 28 June 2011) -- The nesting season of many types of sea bird all around Iceland has been poor this year and there is an all-out puffin and Arctic tern collapse in progress to the south and west of the country. Ornithologists say the situation has not looked worse for many decades. Scientists have been travelling around Iceland in recent days and weeks, researching sea bird stocks and the status of their nesting. RUV reported at the weekend that extremely few Arctic tern nests were found on the Snaefellsnes peninsula, where thousands of the birds usually lay their eggs. A similarly worrying picture is emerging about the puffin stock and the situation is particularly bad on the Westman Islands and the south and west of the Icelandic mainland. Ornithologist Aevar Pedersen told RUV that the situation had been bad last year, but is even worse this year. The overall picture is pretty dismal, he said — adding that he has not seen a worse breeding season for many years, indeed decades. “Among sea birds it is generally extremely poor, and among waders it seems to be quite poor as well — at the very least they are nesting very late. We have been looking at snipes out west on Flatey island in Breidafjordur and there are only about 20 percent as many as there should be. On the other hand, it appears to be a good nesting season for small birds like wagtails and snow buntings,” Pedersen said. The nesting season among Arctic terns and puffins has simply failed to take place in large parts of Iceland. Both species mainly eat sand eels which have almost disappeared — especially in the seas to the south and west of Iceland. Puffins are still nesting in North Iceland, where they feed on capelin; but the lack of sand eels further south is causing Arctic tern and puffin breeding seasons to fail yet again. The most plausible explanation for the sand eels’ disappearance is the continued ocean warming around Iceland.

Polar bears deserve Endangered Species Act protection, judge rules

Amanda Graham — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 07:06:20 GMT

(ENS, 30 June 2011) -- WASHINGTON, DC - A federal judge today upheld a 2008 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decision to protect polar bears under the Endangered Species Act because climate change is threatening their survival. The polar bear was the first species added to the Endangered Species List due solely to the threat from global warming. U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan dismissed challenges to the listing brought by the state of Alaska under the leadership of then-Governor Sarah Palin, and hunting groups, who argued that the listing was unnecessary. They contended that the bear is protected by other laws and that the science does not allow prediction of what effects climate change will have on the species. Judge Sullivan ruled that the Service's decision to protect the bear due to the melting of the Arctic sea ice was well supported. Scientific studies show that, due to the rapid melting of its Arctic habitat, two-thirds of the world's polar bears, including all the bears in Alaska, are likely to become extinct within the next 40 years. Despite finding the evidence of the severity of the polar bear's plight "troubling," Judge Sullivan declined to raise the threat level of the species from threatened to endangered. "It is not this Court's role to determine, based on its independent assessment of the scientific evidence, whether the agency could have reached a different conclusion with regard to the listing of the polar bear," the judge wrote in his ruling. Instead, he wrote, the court's job is only to determine whether the Fish and Wildlife Service's process to reach its own decision was "rational." The plaintiffs failed to demonstrate that the agency's determination "rises to the level or irrationality."

Airlifted Canadian bison sent to Russia to boost species' survival

Amanda Graham — Thu, 05 May 2011 06:30:24 GMT

(Randy Boswell/Postmedia News, 4 May 2011) -- Canadian wildlife officials have delivered a shipment of 30 wood bison from a national park in Alberta to a historic buffalo stomping ground in sub-Arctic Russia — part of a unique, intercontinental gift of natural heritage aimed at boosting the species' long-range chances of survival. The bison airlift, carried out in late March, was the second transplant of the Canadian beasts in the past five years to the Siberian republic of Sakha, where Russian biologists are trying to recreate a long-vanished ecosystem once dominated by the related steppe bison before its extinction about 10,000 years ago. The remarkable wildlife export — made possible with a heavy Russian transport aircraft that required special permission to land at the Edmonton airport — is a showcase project this year for Parks Canada, which is celebrating the 100th anniversary of its creation as an distinct branch of the federal government. ... The arrival of the Canadian animals is a "huge deal" for wildlife specialists in Sakha, said Shury, "because bison haven't been present in that part of the world for over 10,000 years." The first transfer of 30 bison in 2006 was successful, he said, but the additional animals are necessary to achieve enough genetic diversity for the Siberian herd to become self-sustaining. "Once they build up enough of a breeding population," Shury said, "they'd like to release bison into the wild and restore a large herbivore into that landscape that hasn't been there for a long, long time."

Point Lay efforts to protect weary walruses honored by Fish and Wildlife

Amanda Graham — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 22:19:32 GMT

(The Arctic Sounder, 6 April 2011) -- At a community meeting on March 28, the Native Village of Point Lay was presented with an "Outstanding Partner" Award from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Alaska Region, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said in a written statement. Here's the rest of the release: The honor was conferred as part of the annual Regional Director's Excellence Awards, which recognize the work of FWS staff and partners across Alaska. Presented by Service Marine Mammal Management program biologist Jim MacCracken, the award cites the work done be residents of the village to protect walruses in September 2010. At that time, tens of thousands of migrating Pacific walruses hauled out on the Chukchi Sea barrier beach within sight of the small Inupiaq community of Pt. Lay Alaska. see a video of the gathering here. It was an event unprecedented in living human memory and soon became a worldwide media attraction. Residents of Point Lay community took the initiative to protect the resting walruses from disturbance that could have resulted in stampedes that can injure or kill young and weakened animals. Community leaders took an Incident Command approach to protecting the walruses. They issued a news release and walrus photographs to inquiring news media organizations, but also requested that media crews not travel to Point Lay. When media did arrive, the leaders participated in interviews and showed North Slope hospitality, while advising visitors on how to get the stories they needed without disturbing the animals. Point Lay has a distinguished history of working closely with wildlife scientists, especially on beluga and bowhead whales. In this instance the entire community also took the initiative to effectively demonstrate respect, and provide respite, for the thousands of weary Pacific walruses resting near the village. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Alaska Regional Director Geoff Haskett said, "Partners are at the heart of much of what we do as an agency, and this recognition appropriately honors the Native Village of Point Lay for taking the initiative to protect walrus during this almost unprecedented haul-out event."

Size of Western Arctic caribou herd revised downward

Amanda Graham — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 22:28:19 GMT

(Margaret Bauman/The Arctic Sounder, 24 March 2011) -- A continuing modest decline of Alaska's largest caribou herd is being carefully watched by state wildlife biologists, who see the animals as important not only for hunters, but the environment as a whole. "It has our attention," said Jim Dau, a biologist at Kotzebue for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. "We are not ignoring it. This is important not just for subsistence users, but for the whole ecology of the region." Dau said in an interview today that a couple of detailed health analyses conducted by ADF&G veterinarian Kimberly Beckman in Fairbanks concluded that the Western Arctic caribou herd is among the healthiest of the caribou herds in Alaska. There is no indication that disease is causing the decline, he said. A recent further analysis of aerial photos of a July 2009 Western Arctic caribou herd census had prompted state biologists to revise the population estimate down to 348,000 caribou in a continued modest decline. The previous estimate of 401,000 caribou indicated an increase in the herd over the 377,000 animals identified in a 2007 census. "The herd is still vey large, individual caribou appear to be healthy, the rate of decline is still modest, and harvests are not thought to be affecting its status," Dau said in a statement released a day earlier. "The revised estimate will not result in any immediate changes to management activities or hunting opportunities. The revised total is within a range of acceptable count variation and the herd is still considered stable, though slowly declining." Biologists intensified monitoring of this herd after the 2007 census suggested the onset of a decline. The revised 2009 count of 348,000 caribou indicates that the Western Arctic herd has declined 4-6 percent annually since its peak of 490,000 caribou in 2003,. Dau said that after exceeding a population size of 400,000 caribou for over 20 years, a period of slow decline is probably preferable to continued growth and the possibility of an eventual, abrupt decline. Caribou herds fluctuate naturally due to a variety of factors.

Norway joins Canada in seal ban fight

Amanda Graham — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 05:09:04 GMT

(Peter O’Neil/Postmedia News via Nunatsiaq News, 16 March 2011) -- Norway joined Canada March 15 in asking the World Trade Organization to establish a dispute-settlement panel to consider a challenge to the European Union’s seal products ban. “We consider the EU ban on seal products sales to be in violation of WTO rules and want an independent assessment of a dispute settlement panel in the WTO,” said Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store, according to a translation of the government news release. The release said WTO-arranged consultations between Norway and the EU have failed. Canada announced last month that it was asking for a dispute-settlement panel to challenge the ban, which came into force last summer. The process normally takes a year to reach a conclusion, according to the news release. Norwegian Fisheries Minister Lisbeth Berg-Hansen echoed past statements by Canadian politicians, saying it is defending a principle that Norwegians have a right to take part in a sustainable harvest and then sell the products. The European Parliament, dismissing Canada’s argument that the hunt is humane, voted by a margin of 550 to 49 to impose its seal ban in May 2009. Since then, several rounds of trade consultations through the trade organization have failed to resolve the dispute.

Walrus protection can wait: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Amanda Graham — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 23:49:12 GMT

(Yereth Rosen/Reuters, 9 February 2011) -- The Pacific walrus, hampered by vanishing sea ice in Arctic waters, deserves protection under the Endangered Species Act but must wait in line behind more imperiled animals, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman said on Tuesday. The decision dashed environmentalists' hopes that the lumbering, long-tusked marine mammal would soon join the polar bear as a federally protected icon of global warming. But it also drew criticism from Alaska's Republican senator, Lisa Murkowski, who sided with the oil industry and other commercial interests in opposing new safeguards for either animal. In a move that seemed to satisfy no one, the agency determined that listing the walrus as a threatened or endangered species was warranted but "precluded," in part because higher-priority species, including a sea bird that feeds near coastal glaciers, need protecting first. Agency spokesman Bruce Woods said difficulty in obtaining an accurate walrus population count and lingering uncertainty about how their numbers may have declined also were factors in the "warranted but precluded" recommendation. The decision comes nearly two months after the government proposed listing two types of seals -- ringed and bearded seals -- as threatened species because the Arctic ice and snow they depend on is shrinking due to climate change. They became the second and third animals, after polar bears, to be recommended for protection under the Endangered Species Act because of ice loss in Alaska.

Midwinter ice storms deadly for Alaska's animal herds

Amanda Graham — Sun, 06 Feb 2011 06:07:31 GMT

(Craig Medred/Alaska Dispatch, 2 February 2011) -- Once more ice coats the brush and snow of Northwest Alaska, and Alaska Department of Fish and Game biologist Jim Dau wonders how the caribou will fare this time. Twice since 2005, the animals of the Western Arctic caribou herd have been hit hard by ice storms that threatened to lock their forage away beneath a layer of white pavement. After the first of those storms, large numbers of caribou suffered from starvation. Dau described them as dying "in droves." They have not been the only animals to struggle with winter ice in Alaska's volatile climate in recent years, either. In the Chugach and Kenai mountains, Tom Lohuis, a Fish and Game biologist studying Dall sheep, has begun to examine icing as a possible cause of significant mortality. Lohuis is early in his studies but he has already found evidence in the Dall sheep population of Southcentral that is analogous to what Dau has seen in the Arctic -- animals hard pressed to survive because of a layer of ice coating the ground or the snow. Neither caribou nor sheep are well equipped for chipping through frozen surfaces to get at their food. Both Dau and Lohuis have seen ice related deaths and use the phrase "bags of bones" to describe the animals that manage to survive winters with serious ice events..

Polar bear's epic nine day swim in search of sea ice

Amanda Graham — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 21:08:09 GMT

(Ella Davies /BBC Earth News, 25 January 2011) -- A polar bear swam continuously for over nine days, covering 687km (426 miles), a new study has revealed. Scientists studying bears around the Beaufort sea, north of Alaska, claim this endurance feat could be a result of climate change. Polar bears are known to swim between land and sea ice floes to hunt seals. But the researchers say that increased sea ice melts push polar bears to swim greater distances, risking their own health and future generations. In their findings, published in Polar Biology, researchers from the US Geological Survey reveal the first evidence of long distance swimming by polar bears (Ursus maritimus). "This bear swam continuously for 232 hours and 687 km and through waters that were 2-6 degrees C," says research zoologist George M. Durner. "We are in awe that an animal that spends most of its time on the surface of sea ice could swim constantly for so long in water so cold. It is truly an amazing feat." Although bears have been observed in open water in the past, this is the first time one's entire journey has been followed. By fitting a GPS collar to a female bear, researchers were able to accurately plot its movements for two months as it sought out hunting grounds. The scientists were able to determine when the bear was in the water by the collar data and a temperature logger implanted beneath the bear's skin. The study shows that this epic journey came at a very high cost to the bear. "This individual lost 22% of her body fat in two months and her yearling cub," says Mr Durner. "It was simply more energetically costly for the yearling than the adult to make this long distance swim," he explains. Mr Durner tells the BBC that conditions in the Beaufort sea have become increasingly difficult for polar bears.

Creator of Arctic National Wildlife Refuge honored

Amanda Graham — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 20:47:19 GMT

(Estes Park Trail-Gazette, 25 January 2011)** -- Estes Park resident Dr. Robert Krear was one of the speakers for the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the creation of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. Dr. Krear was invited to the headquarters of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service near Washington, D.C., the week of Jan. 17-21 to speak at the anniversary ceremony. In Washington, he was reunited with Dr. George Schaller. Along with Krear, they are the only surviving members of the famous Murie Arctic expedition. The two were among the featured speakers at this symposium involving numerous Alaskan biologists, refuge managers and other members of the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Among the other speakers was former president Jimmy Carter. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is the largest wildlife refuge in the United States. It is an area of great natural beauty that has been called the Serengeti of North America because of the wildlife populations that exist there. Dr. Krear considers his participation in the creation of the Arctic refuge the greatest contribution of his life. It all began in 1956, when Dr. Krear, a local retired biology professor and scientist, received a phone call from Dr. Olaus Murie of Jackson Hole, Wyo., who invited him to join Murie`s expedition to the northeast corner of Arctic Alaska for the purpose of assisting in ecological studies during exploration of that primitive area. It had been determined by the nation`s top environmentalists following World War II that that area of Alaska was the last pristine Arctic wilderness area remaining on the entire planet. There was an urgent necessity to preserve it from commercialization.

Former president talks about preserving Arctic refuge

Amanda Graham — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 16:58:48 GMT

(West Virginia Public Radio - 19 January 2011) -- Yesterday afternoon attendees to the U.S Fish and Wildlife Services heard from former President Jimmy Carter about his efforts to expand the Arctic refuge and protect it from oil drilling. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was created in 1960 under Dwight D. Eisenhower’s administration. But it was President Jimmy Carter and his interior secretary Cecil Andrus who found a way to expand the refuge over the objections of former Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK). Carter said he and Andrus used the 1906 Antiquities Act to declare 17 parcels precious places they wanted to preserve. “And the cumulative size of them was 67 million acres, about the same size as the state of Minnesota to put it in perspective,” Carter said. Carter said Stevens, along with some oil and gas companies, argued to the U.S. Supreme Court that what the President did was unconstitutional. “To make a long story short the Supreme Court ruled in my favor,” Carter said. Carter’s decision to preserve so much land was not popular with many Alaskans. ... Carter has tried unsuccessfully to convince the democratic presidents who’ve served since he left office to do more to protect the refuge and he stands ready to fight any future efforts to drill for oil there.