‘Soul-crushing’ footage has emerged of a starving wild polar bear scouring a desolate landscape for food.
In heartbreaking scenes, which brought the cameraman who captured them to tears, the emaciated creature can be seen scavenging for sustenance, stumbling over terrain devoid of ice.
Rummaging in a rubbish bin for a life-saving morsel he comes up empty, before slumping to the ground waiting for death.
In heartbreaking scenes, which brought the cameraman who captured them to tears, the emaciated creature can be seen scavenging for sustenance, stumbling over terrain devoid of ice. The clip was recorded by photographer Paul Nicklen, who is part of conservation group Sea Legacy
The clip, taken on Canada’s Baffin Island, was recorded by photographer Paul Nicklen, who is part of conservation group Sea Legacy.
The former biologist, who has now turned his hand to wildlife photography has seen over 3,000 bears in the wild, but this particular encounter will no doubt linger in Mr Nicklen’s memory.
It is illegal to feed wild polar bears in Canada, but even if he had been able to, he would only have been delaying the inevitable.
Speaking to National Geographic, he said: ‘We stood there crying, filming with tears rolling down our cheeks.
‘Of course, that crossed my mind, But it’s not like I walk around with a tranquilliser gun or 400 pounds of seal meat.’
The photographer shared the haunting moment with his Instagram followers, attracting over one million views at the time of publication.
One of the bear’s back legs can be seen dragging behind it as it walks, likely due to muscle atrophy from lack of food.
The bear is likely to have died ‘within hours or days of this moment’, Mr Nicklen said on the photo sharing site.
Writing in the accompanying caption, he said: ‘My entire Sea Legacy team was pushing through their tears and emotions while documenting this dying polar bear.
Disturbing footage of a starving wild polar bear scouring a desolate landscape for food has taken the internet by storm. Rummaging in a rubbish bin for a life-saving morsel he comes up empty, before slumping to the ground waiting for death
The clip was recorded by photographer Paul Nicklen, who is part of conservation group Sea Legacy who says he captured the creature’s lingering agony because he didn’t want its death to be in vain
It is illegal to feed wild polar bears in Canada, but even if he had been able to, he would only have been delaying the inevitable. About the moment, Mr Nicklin said: ‘We stood there crying, filming with tears rolling down our cheeks’
The former biologist who has now turned his hand to wildlife photography has seen over 3,000 bears in the wild, but this particular encounter will no doubt linger in his memory
‘It’s a soul-crushing scene that still haunts me, but I know we need to share both the beautiful and the heartbreaking if we are going to break down the walls of apathy.
‘This is what starvation looks like. The muscles atrophy. No energy. It’s a slow, painful death.’
The wildlife photographer says he captured the creature’s lingering agony because he didn’t want its death to be in vain.
By raising awareness of the death of this particular polar bear, Mr Nicklen hopes to bring home the reality of global warming for the entire species.
As home to the The Barnes Ice Cap, Baffin Island has been particularly hard hit by the warming climate.
The ice cap in the Canadian Arctic, which is around the size of Delaware or or four times the size of Greater London, is the last piece of ice sheet that once blanketed much of North America.
A THIRD OF THE WORLD’S POLAR BEARS ‘WILL DISAPPEAR IN THE NEXT 40 YEARS BECAUSE OF MELTING SEA ICE’
Polar bear numbers are expected to collapse by a third in as little as 35 years as ice melts in the Arctic, a 2016 study found.
The drop in numbers will reduce the world population of the bears from around 26,000 to 17,000.
Researchers put the probability off a steep fall of around 30 per cent over the next three generations of bears at 71 per cent.
The researchers put the time frame of between 35 and 41 years.
The findings are consistent with polar bears being listed as ‘vulnerable’ on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list of threatened and endangered species.
Loss of sea ice due to climate change has a direct impact on the ability of polar bears to feed and survive.
The bears need platforms of ice to reach their prey of ringed and bearded seals. Some sea ice lies over more productive hunting areas than others.
Polar bear numbers are expected to collapse by a third in as little as 35 years as ice melts in the Arctic, a 2016 study found. The drop in numbers will reduce the world population of the bears from around 26,000 to 17,000
Scientists have divided polar bears into 19 sub-populations, two of which have already experienced population declines due to shrinking sea ice.
Others have shown signs of ‘nutritional stress’ or are currently said to be ‘stable’ or ‘productive’, according to the study authors.
The researchers combined polar bear generational length with sea ice projections based on satellite data and computer simulations.
They worked out the probability that reductions in the mean global population size of polar bears will be greater than 30 per cent, 50 per cent and 80 per cent in the space of three generations.
While the likelihood of a more than 30 per cent loss was high, there was little chance of populations crashing to near-extinction levels.
Writing in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters, the team, led by Dr Eric Regehr from the US Fish and Wildlife Service, concluded: ‘Our findings support the potential for large declines in polar bear numbers owing to sea ice loss.’
Although the ice cap is still 500 meters (1,600 feet) thick, it’s melting at a rapid pace driven by increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that have elevated Arctic temperatures.
In March, scientists announced that, under a ‘business-as-usual’ greenhouse gas emissions scenario, the last remnant of the North American ice sheet is set to melt in about 300 years.
‘There is no band aid solution. There was no saving this individual bear. People think that we can put platforms in the ocean or we can feed the odd starving bear.
‘The simple truth is this — if the Earth continues to warm, we will lose bears and entire polar ecosystems. This large male bear was not old, and he certainly died within hours or days of this moment.
‘But there are solutions. We must reduce our carbon footprint, eat the right food, stop cutting down our forests, and begin putting the Earth — our home — first.’
The photographer shared the haunting moment with his Instagram followers, attracting over one million views at the time of publication. The bear is likely to have died ‘within hours or days of this moment’, he added on the photo sharing site
By raising awareness of the death of this particular polar bear, Mr Nicklen hopes to bring home the reality of global warming for the entire species
Polar bear numbers are expected to collapse by a third in as little as 35 years as ice melts in the Arctic, a 2016 study found. The drop in numbers will reduce the world population of the bears from around 26,000 to 17,000
The footage was taken on Baffin Island, in the northern Canadian territory of Nunavut. It is the largest island in Canada and the fifth largest island in the world, but has been heavily effected by the ravages of global warming and dwindling ice
THE LAURENTIDE ICE SHEET
The Laurentide Ice Sheet once covered millions of square miles of North America
The Barnes Ice Cap on Baffin Island is part of the Laurentide Ice Sheet that has covered millions of square miles of North America episodically since the start of the Quaternary Period about 2.5 million years ago.
It grew and shrank as Earth went through various climate cycles, and the ice was a mile thick at Chicago 20,000 years ago.
But it started receding 14,000 years ago when Earth slipped out of its last ice age.
It stabilised about 2,000 years until the effects of the recent warming caught up with it.
At its peak, the sheet stretched down to New York, forming the city we know today, from Long Island—created by moraines and outwash from the glacier—to the archipelago of greater New York City, created by rising tides as the ice sheet melted.
Even Central Park is littered with boulders left over from its movement.
Neighbourhoods in the city are named for this ancient ice event.
Flatbush in Brooklyn is the point where the ice stopped and began to retreat, leaving low-lying neighbourhoods like Canarsie and the outwash beaches, like Coney Island.