<div style="text-align: justify; "><b style="font-size: 1rem;">Polar bears are disappearing fast from the Western part of Hudson Bay, on the southern tip of the Canadian Arctic, according to a new government survey.</b><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>&nbsp;</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The number of female bears and cubs in particular has seen a dramatic decline.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify; ">Researchers have flown over the region -- which includes the town of Churchill, a tourist destination touted as the "polar bear capital of the world" -- every five years to count the number of bears and extrapolate population trends.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">During the last survey in late August and early September 2021, the results of which were released earlier this month, they spotted 194 bears and, based on that count, estimated a total population of 618 bears, down from 842 five years earlier.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">"Comparison to aerial surveys estimates from 2011 and 2016 suggests that the WH (Western Hudson Bay population) may be decreasing in abundance," the study said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">It also "revealed significant declines in the abundance of adult female and subadult bears (cubs) between 2011 and 2021."</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">"The observed declines are consistent with long-standing predictions regarding the demographic effects of climate change on polar bears," the researchers said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">They also cited possible displacements of bears to neighboring regions and hunting for the population decline.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">The bears' sea-ice habitat has been disappearing at an alarming rate, with the far north warming up to four times faster than the rest of the world.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">The sea ice has become less thick and is breaking up earlier in the spring as well as freezing later in the fall.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">The bears rely on the ice for foraging for seals, movement and reproduction.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">Since the 1980s, the ice pack in the bay has decreased by nearly 50 percent in summer, according to the US National Snow and Ice Data Center.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">A report published two years ago in the journal Nature Climate Change suggested this trend could lead to the near-extinction of these animals, noting there were 1,200 polar bears on the western shores of Hudson Bay in the 1980s. AFP</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd24/kh</div>