First case of a polar bear chasing a reindeer in the water: they film it when it has reached and eaten it

The life of polar bears is one of the most studied things in the animal kingdom. The species is known to be critically endangered due to climate change and they normally hunt sea ice seals in the Arctic Circle. But as they are being “pushed” onto land by the rapidly diminishing ice sheets they inhabit, many of them now scavenge for food there.

A year ago, when biologists from the Polish polar station, located in the norwegian archipelago of svalbardpublished the first images of a polar bear hunting and eating a reindeer, something unprecedented, nothing suggested this behavior.

The polar bear it was seen about 100 meters from the baseprompting several scientists to go out and get a better look at the wild animal.

The deadly hunt began when an adult female polar bear chased down an adult reindeer trying to escape the predator. swim in Isbjørnhamna bay. It took the polar bear just over a minute to reach its prey, kill it, and then drag it to shore where the bear tore it apart to devour.

The team believes this behavior is not just due to loss of sea ice, but rather because the Arctic has undergone a increase in the reindeer population over the past three decades and are more accessible to endangered predators. Furthermore, the reindeer has been granted “federal protection” by several governments, including the Swedish one.

‘Sources prior to 2000 state that polar bears did not attack reindeer on Svalbard,’ the researchers wrote in the paper published in Polar biology. “This report is the first description and documentation of the full course of a polar bear hunt for adult reindeer,” they added in the report.

The document also includes at least 12 reports from passers-by of seeing bears hunting or eating reindeer, which the team says is evidence that attacks are becoming more frequent.

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endangered polar bears

The total population of polar bears could become extinct around 2100 due to climate change, according to research published in the journal “Nature”. Some 26,000 specimens survive in 19 colonieslocated in an extensive strip near the North Pole, from Svalbard (Norway) to Hudson Bay, Canada.

“Most likely, the impact we predict will occur much earlier than the study suggests,” warned the American zoologist. steven amstrupthe head of the group of scientists of the Polar Bears International organization that conducted the survey.

The data recorded by the specialists indicate that the polar bears of Russia and Alaska would start to have serious problems surviving from 2080, even if as early as 2040 they would have difficulty reproducingdue to the decrease in the mass of ice, its natural habitat, according to the current projection of greenhouse gas emissions.

The normal population of polar bears in the Beaufort Sea (in Alaska, USA) has been reduced by between 25 and 30%. In turn, the number of specimens in Hudson Bay decreased by almost a third since 1987.

The general pessimism of the scientific community recognizes as a key fact the excessive amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) detected in the atmosphere. “It should be noted that these projections are quite conservative,” explains the group led by Amstrup.

The work of the experts mainly dealt with the analysis of the physiological limit of the animals. That is, how long could polar bears go without finding seals to feed on? what reserve of energy they have to survive and reproduce.