POLAR BEARS

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POLAR
CORBIS
©
IMAGES:
BEARS
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POLAR BEARS
Extinction
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On The Brink Of Extinction
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Q & A
Do Americans support polar bear trophy hunting?
With the exception of subsistence hunting by Alaska natives, Americans may not hunt polar bears in the United States and
The Polar Bear Protection Act
Americans do not support shooting polar bears for their heads and hides.1 The meat from these animals is not consumed by the
hunters and they are not shot for population control. Most of these animals are killed simply as a head-hunting exercise.
Polar bears, the largest predators on land, have become the
worldwide poster child for the impact that global warming is
What is the status of Canadian polar bear populations from which Americans can
take polar bear trophies?
having on our planet. These majestic animals are completely
Americans can only import polar bears from the following approved populations: Lancaster Sound, Norwegian Bay, Western
dependent on their Arctic sea-ice habitat, a habitat that is
Hudson Bay, Northern Beaufort Sea, Southern Beaufort Sea, and Viscount Melville Sound. Of these, two populations are among
those that the USGS states will be gone in less than 50 years. The remaining four populations, according to the report, will be either
shrinking before our eyes. Global warming is slowly melting the
severely reduced or gone by the year 2100.
sea ice that polar bears need to breed, den, and hunt, resulting
Does money from polar bear trophy hunting contribute to species conservation?
in drowning bears, starvation, litters of fewer offspring, and
Only $750 Canadian dollars of the $31,000 that is charged for polar bear hunting is designated for conservation. An August 2005
lower cub survival rates.
article in the Nunatsiaq News, a Nunavut newspaper, concluded that “most of the [financial benefits from sport hunts] never reach
Inuit hands, and when they do, those earnings vary substantially from community to community.”
While long-term action is required to address the significant environmental factors
negatively affecting polar bear survival, immediate action can and should be taken to
What are the threats facing polar bear survival?
The fragile state of the world’s polar bears has been recognized on both a global and a national level. Polar bears currently face
address the harm caused by trophy hunting. With unprecedented stresses facing polar
unprecedented threats from global climate change and sea ice reduction, environmental degradation such as contaminants
bears today they are in very real danger of becoming extinct.
(e.g., heavy metals, PCBs, DDT), pollution from oil and gas development, and trophy hunting.
GONOR
The Polar Bear Protection Act would amend the Marine Mammal
Is trophy hunting really a threat to polar bears?
Protection Act by removing the language that was added in
Yes. Many of the polar bear trophies are taken from the very populations in Canada that the September 2007 USGS report states
will be gone in less than 50 years. Also, new science indicates that the targeting of male polar bears by trophy hunters is placing
1994 allowing Americans to import polar bear trophies
several populations in even further risk of dramatic decline. The newest information available makes it abundantly clear that
from Canada.
MARINETHEMES.COM/SAUL
Canadian trophy hunting is no longer sustainable.
©
Polar bear trophy hunting will end, one
Would the Polar Bear Protection Act affect subsistence hunters?
way or another. It can either end now
No. The bill still allows harvest for subsistence, as well as for scientific and educational purposes.
while there’s still hope that polar
bears can survive and recover,
1Kellert, Stephen. ‘American Perceptions of Marine Mammals and Their Management,’ Yale University School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. May 1999.
or later, when all the bears are
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BACKGROUND
I N T E R N A T I O N A L F U N D F O R A N I M A L W E L F A R E
Polar bears have been hunted for their hides and meat by native
growing long-term threat of global warming, one would think that we would do all that we can here and now to
peoples of the Arctic region for centuries. In recent years,
prevent the extinction of this iconic Arctic species. But we’re not. We are still allowing Americans to kill polar bears
however, subsistence hunting has given way to sport hunting,
and bring home their heads and hides.
mainly by Americans, dramatically increasing the number of
polar bears taken from the wild.
In 2007, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed to list the polar bear under the Endangered
Species Act. Subsequent scientific findings like those found in the September 2007 USGS report
Prior to the passage of the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) in
and a recent study by the University of Alberta shed new light on just how dire the situation
1972, sport hunting was identified as the primary or sole cause of polar bear
has become, with the University study suggesting that polar bear populations may be
population declines in places such as Alaska. Once trophy hunting was
pushed to the brink of collapse if hunters continue to kill too many males.
prohibited in the U.S., most Alaskan populations began to recover.
Although Canada still allowed trophy hunting, the importation of polar bear
Bottom line: The polar bear trophy hunt, once thought to be harmless,
trophies was strictly forbidden for more than 20 years. However in 1994, at
is only exacerbating the frightening decline of the polar bear.
the behest of politically powerful special interest groups, Congress created a
1See Proceedings of the 14th Working Meeting of the IUCN/SSC Polar Bear Specialist Group,
loophole in the MMPA to allow Americans to hunt polar bears in Canada
20-24 June 2005, Seattle, Washington, USA. Available at http://pbsg.npolar.no/docs/PBSG14proc.pdf
and bring home their trophies. Since 1997, over 960 permits have been issued to American hunters by the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service for the importation of trophy-hunted polar bear heads and hides.
P O L A R B E A R P O P U L AT I O N S M A P
Despite continued warnings from the scientific community, the Government of Nunavut has steadily increased
GONOR
Amur
Sea of Okhotsk
polar bear harvest quotas. Then, in 2005, the World Conservation Union (IUCN) up-listed the polar bear on its
Yell
Gulf of Alaska
Se
Red List for the first time from a species of “least concern” to “vulnerable.” The IUCN Polar Bear Specialist Group
stated that the polar bear population, currently estimated between 20,000-25,000, could drop 30 percent in the
coming 35-50 years and that polar bears may disappear from most of their range within 100 years.
Chukchi Sea
Yukon
Aldan
MARINETHEMES.COM/SAUL
Colorado
R o c k y M o u n t a i n s
©
In September, 2007, the U.S. Geological Service (USGS)
A L A S K A
The polar bear trophy
CS
released a series of reports commissioned by the Department
MacKenzie
hunt, once thought to
Great
Beaufort Sea
SBS
of the Interior concluding that by 2050, less than 45 years
Bear L.
Lena
L. Baykal
Lena
be harmless, is only
from now, we will have lost fully two-thirds of the world’s
LVS
Amstrup
Great
Leptev Sea
polar bear populations. The USGS predicted that the
POLAR BASIN
Slave L.
exacerbating the
NBS

et
Missouri
remaining polar bears would disappear gradually after that,
Angara
al.
frightening decline
Divergent ice
C A N A D A
VM
Convergent ice
U.S.
L. Winnipeg
ARCTIC OCEAN
with only a small population hanging on to see the next
MC
Geological
ippi
-300 m isobath
of the polar bear.
century. Given the dire situation for polar bears and the
Archipelago
Mississ
AB
WHB
LS NW
Seasonal Ice
Yenisey
Survey
Hudson Bay
GB
KS
Populations that
R U S S I A
will be gone
Great Lakes
SHB
KB
FB
QE
within 45 years.
,
2007.
io
Populations that
Kara
an
Baffin Bay
will
Irtysh
be gone
Sea
Mts.
D
BS
BB
within 75 years.
N
Ob'
L A
N
Greenland
E
Ural
L. Balkhash
Populations from
E
Sea
Barents Sea
R
Mts.
which U.S. hunters
G
DS
may import polar
EG
bear trophies.
Aral Sea
Volga
Norwegian Sea
The polar basin Divergent Ice Ecoregion includes: Southern Beaufort Sea (SBS), Chukchi Sea (CS), Laptev Sea (LVS), Kara Sea (KS), and the Barents Sea (BS).
The polar basin Convergent Ice Ecoregion includes: East Greenland (EG), Queen Elizabeth (QE), and Northern Beaufort Sea (NBS).
The Seasonal Ice Ecoregion includes: Southern Hudson Bay (SHB), Western Hudson Bay (WHB), Foxe Basin (FB), Davis Straight (DS), and Baffin Bay (BB).
The Archipelago Ecoregion includes: Gulf of Boothia (GB), M’Clintock Channel (MC), Lancaster Sound (LS), Viscount-Melville Sound (VM),
Norwegian Bay (NW), and Kane Basin (KB).
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