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By 2026, the earth is projected to be an average of 3.6 degrees warmer than it was in 1750. Nowhere is the profound impact of the earth's rising temperature more evident than in the vast region above the Artic circle. The area covered by summer sea ice in the Arctic is decreasing by 9.2 percent per decade and it will disappear entirely by the end of this century unless the situation is rectified.

Because of the earth's alarming rising temperature trend and the effect it is having on the polar ice caps, polar bears face the real possibility of extinction in the next few decades. "For anyone who has wondered how global warming and reduced sea ice will affect polar bears, the answer is simple - they die," said Richard Steiner, a marine-biology professor at the University of Alaska.

Scientific research predicts polar bears will become extinct because they have adapted over time to only hunting on ice. If they try to swim in dissipating ice conditions to catch seals, the more likely they are to tire and drown. In 2004, scientists for the first time documented multiple deaths of polar bears off Alaska, where they drowned after swimming long distances in the ocean. The melting of the Arctic polar ice caps precludes the bears from making their customary short jaunts between ice sheets.

The polar bear's primary food source is seals. When research showed that the rapid melting of the glacial modes of transportation that seals use was in rapid decline, the polar bear's meal ticket became much sparser. While drowning is the biggest concern from the effects of the melting ice sheets, polar bears may also become victims to mass starvation because of the lack of seals.

Unless there is a fast forwarding in the evolutionary process, polar bears are destined to starve because they haven't adapted to hunting land animals like caribou, which are preyed upon by more-aggressive grizzly bears. Polar bears also require more fat intake than most food on land offers them, which is why they prey on seals to store that fat for the long winter slumber

It's not that the polar bears aren't trying to adapt to their declining ecosystem. Over the past five years, an unusually large number of bears have congregated along the beaches by the coastal town of Barrow, Alaska. Canadian researchers counted as many as 200 bears on land and they were seen gathered around whale carcasses near fishing villages.

The Canadian Wildlife Service found that the population of polar bears in Canada's western Hudson Bay, which is at the southernmost point for polar bear habitation, fell to 935 in 2004 from 1,194 in 1987. The Service stated the decline was in conjunction with a full month's extension of the time it takes for Hudson Bay to ice over after the summer.

By September 2004, the polar ice cap retreated a record 160 miles north of the northern coast of Alaska. For the first time in recorded history, a shipping lane is now open between Europe and the Far East that travels through the Artic Circle. The deterioration of the polar bear's ecosystem is astounding and, in an emotional sense, very sad.

Scientists estimate there are 20,000 to 25,000 polar bears worldwide. That number will diminish until one day when the majestic polar bear becomes an extinct species.

Learn more about this author, Keith Bailey.
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