Starving Polar Bears Turn to Cannibalism

[bonnie]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/6760103/Starving-polar-bears-turn-to-cannibalism.html

Have to wonder if these scientists are aware that male polar bears will eat cubs. They always have

Starving polar bears turn to cannibalism

New pictures show that polar bears are beginning to cannibalise each other as global warming destroys its hunting grounds.

By Jonathan Liew

Published: 2:40PM GMT 08 Dec 2009

Starving polar bears turn to cannibalism

Scientists say they are aware of eight cases of bear cannibalisation so far this year Photo: REUTERS

The images, taken in Hudson Bay, Canada, around 200 miles north of the town of Churchill, Manitoba, show a male polar bear carrying the bloodied head of a polar bear cub it has killed for food.

Polar bears usually subsist on seals, which they hunt from a platform of sea ice. But the melting of sea ice as a result of rising global temperatures has made it more difficult for polar bears to hunt seals at sea, confining the bears to land.

This has led to malnourishment and starvation as polar bears are unable to build sufficient fat reserves for winter.

Drowning is also more common as bears are forced to swim further out to sea to find food.

The images add to the evidence that polar bears are increasingly hunting each other for food in their desperation to survive.

Manitoba Conservation normally receive one to two reports of bear cannibalisation annually, but scientists say they are aware of eight cases so far this year.

Last month tourists on a guided tour of the area were reported to be distressed after witnessing a male bear eating a cub.

The release of the images comes as world leaders gather in Copenhagen for the United Nations Climate Change Conference.

What a coincidence in timing

[bonnie]

BONNIE

WELL this is an interesting article but also a sad one

dgrimm60

It's nature and nature isn't always kind or fair

[Guest]

That's a bunch of phony baloney, liberal environmentalist whacko, bull pucky.

[Guest]

Makes me wish I knew how to cuss!

[bonnie]

Makes me wish I knew how to cuss!

You still seem quite descriptive without the cuss words.

Ever watch nature planet on polar bears. Beautiful animals but the males are not known for their fatherly protection of cubs

[there buster]

We have lots of data on polar bears. the reason they turn to cannibalism is NOT global warming. Instead of extinction (a la Algore's Convenient Hype) there are more polar bears now than any time in recent history. Too many bears, not enough prey-- cannibalism.

[Guest]

My stomach won't let me watch public tv.

[bonnie]

My stomach won't let me watch public tv.

My husband watches animal and history on cable almost non stop

[Dr. Shane]

Looks like someone was listening to Rush Limbaugh.

[bonnie]

Looks like someone was listening to Rush Limbaugh.

I really hope someone gives you a new crystal ball for christmas.The one you use must be worn out.

While I listen to Rush some days and have no reason not to quote him if he is in fact where something comes from,Reuters is where I first read it.Then the UK Telegraph.

I assume Rush must have had something on the polar bears lately.

As I only caught the last 15-20 minutes or so today it must have been earlier.

Just to put your mind at ease,if you are keeping track, and need to know which days I may have listened,I will try to remember to let you know.

I didn't think that was important but you must as this is not the first time you have brought it up.

What I do think is important, is it is yet another fabrication of the "climate changing" fabricators.

Their cause seems to be so important they need to continue with less than the truth.

[bonnie]

This must be what you wanted

RUSH: So Copenhagen started yesterday. Remember the false, hoaxed, totally Photoshopped pictures of polar bears frolicking on little, small, ice cube type things that were said to be the remnants of melting glaciers, and they were just ice floes. And polar bears hang around on them all the time because they're cold. It's ice. Polar bears hang around ice. You put one in a zoo in New York in the summertime, and they have to put blocks of ice in there for the polar bears to lay on. So they put these pictures all around, Gore uses them in his movie, and little kids, "Oh, no, the polar bears are dying, they're going to drown!" Polar bears can swim 60 miles.

Reuters has done it again. I'm holding here in my formerly nicotine-stained fingers: "Starving Polar Bears Turn to Cannibalism," on the second day of Copenhagen. It's from the UK Telegraph, and there is a picture of a polar bear eating another polar bear. Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah. "New pictures show that polar bears are beginning to cannibalise each other as global warming destroys its hunting grounds. The images, taken in Hudson Bay, Canada, around 200 miles north of the town of Churchill, Manitoba, show a male polar bear carrying the bloodied head of a polar bear cub it has killed for food. Polar bears usually subsist on seals, which they hunt from a platform of sea ice. But the melting of sea ice as a result of rising global temperatures has made it more difficult for polar bears to hunt seals at sea." None of this is true. If you know anything about polar bears, and this whole article is based on a few photographs, and little kids are going to be scared to death seeing this, but if you know anything about polar bears, you know that there are any number of reasons why polar bears attack each other. Anybody who watches nature shows, nature shows are about what? Animals eating each other. I used to watch those things and say, "Where's the animal rights crowd on this?"

I watched the Planet Earth show that BBC put together, Blu-ray, a lot of it is animals eating each other. The poor wildebeests seem to be targeted by everything that walks or crawls over in Africa. But did you know that polar bear males are well known for eating their young if given half a chance? They do. The mother, the female polar bear has to protect the cubs from the father and other males. Polar bears are a vicious species. They're not this cuddly little old English sheepdog type thing. People go out on ice floes to study these things, and if they attack they have to shoot them. They're not at all in any way tame, and they're huge. They can rip you to shreds inside of five seconds, they wouldn't care, and Reuters would run a picture and blame it all on global warming, not the fact that a polar bear is a polar bear. Polar bears eat their young, if given half the chance, males do. So another hoax, 100% total fraud on the second day of Copenhagen.

[Dr. Shane]

This is old news. This story contains no new information about the polar bears. If we like old news so much, why not start a thread about how much energy Al Gore Jr. uses at his house?

[phkrause]

So what do you watch Richard?

pk

[bonnie]

This is old news. This story contains no new information about the polar bears. If we like old news so much, why not start a thread about how much energy Al Gore Jr. uses at his house?

This is the first I have seen of the "polar bear turning cannibal"

I don't think anyone said "Shane likes old news". Nor did I know that what you considered old news was old to everyone or that you spoke for everyone.

What Al Gore stands to make with the great big hoax is probably more telling about the man than his gluttony consumption of his home.

[Dr. Shane]

The polar bear hoax is old news. Same book, different page.

[bonnie]

The polar bear hoax is old news. Same book, different page.

Shane,

I hope you are not offended but I don't feel any obligation to check with you or depend on you to say what is old news or isn't.

I read it for the first time today,perhaps I should have checked with you first but really don't believe that should be necessary.

Again,one of the nice things about this country still is we can read what we want and can dismiss it if we have already read it and go onto something else.

[Dr. Shane]

I have been reading about the polar bear hoax for a long time. Al Gore Jr. even mentions it in his movie.

What I haven't heard is that the penguins are endangered. Now that would be news to me. Maybe global warming is only impacting the northern hemisphere but not the southern. Those penguins are pretty defenseless too. A polar bear is tough and strong but penguins don't have a lot going for them.

[bonnie]

I have been reading about the polar bear hoax for a long time. Al Gore Jr. even mentions it in his movie.

What I haven't heard is that the penguins are endangered. Now that would be news to me. Maybe global warming is only impacting the northern hemisphere but not the southern. Those penguins are pretty defenseless too. A polar bear is tough and strong but penguins don't have a lot going for them.

They have more than most of us.They have Al Gore and his very questionable but able tactics

[Ted Oplinger]

Well, Shane, I've also been reading about the polar bear hoax for at least 10 years now. What it looks like is that the whackos have made some newer photos to go with a new(er), and have thrown the old arguments in for good measure.

It is the first time they mentioned "cannabilism" that I can remember right off hand.

Common sense has gone out the window. Every good zoologist should know that males in a great number of species of the predators will hunt down and kill offspring that they did not sire - including the bears of all kinds.

Polar bears have survived both warming and cooling periods of our planet's history. With the hysteria seen today, it makes one wonder how the polar bear survived the Medieval Warm Period (~800's to ~1200's, if memory serves me right), where it was so warm the Vikings not only colonized Greenland, they grew crops and cattle for generations on land that is now frozen year after year, and covered with ice. In short, much warmer than anything we've seen in the last few decades.

Penguins, too, have survived the same cycles at the other pole - and also have gone through the cyclical ozone depletions and replenishings in the air above Antarctica. They, too, will be just fine.