*Photography by Kim Hansen, Creative Commons
Polar bears occassionally turn up around Nuuk. Maybe once every year or two. But they don’t belong here. Normally they would stay with the sea ice, and there is no sea ice this far south on the west coast. But changing times mean that the bears are being blown with the wind, literally. The climate is changing – weird weather, wet winters, retreating and thinning ice. And the animals are changing their habits accordingly, becoming unpredictable. Polar bear sightings on land are more common and they’re eating what they can. In fact, researchers have found that bears on the east coast are now feeding on birds’ eggs. Sadly for the birds, this means some colonies now lose 90% of their chicks before hatching.
But it’s not just the odd bear too far south in Greenland. Icelanders are increasingly noticing unwelcome visitors from Greenland. Polar bears don’t live in Iceland. In fact, there have been few sightings of polar bears in Iceland in recorded history – Iceland is a very long way from Greenland. But over the past ten years there have been three polar bears emerge from the Arctic Sea onto the rocky island. The last one, in 2016, was a healthy female, thousands of miles from home.
So what do you do when a half ton, unwanted immigrant shows up on your doorstep? It’s not so practical to just shoo it back into the water – a polar bear is not going to be keen on another thousand mile swim shortly after completing the first one. To their credit, the Icelanders tried at least to consider the options. But there weren’t so many to consider. They have no zoo. And aside from the fact that the Greenlanders were not the least interested in receiving their bear back, the logistics of tranquilizing a half ton apex predator, loading it onto a plane, and delivering it to the east coast of Greenland were stupendously complex, hazardous, and costly. Meanwhile, local Icelanders rushed to get a glimpse of the bear, further increasing the possibility of an unpleasant ending for all involved.
Reluctantly, the Icelandic authorities shot their lone example of a land-based endangered species.
What next? Well, if we reduce our greenhouse gas emissions then maybe the Arctic Ocean won’t be ice free in two generations, as some predict, and there might be a chance for the polar bears. And if we don’t, the bears probably won’t make it as far as Iceland anymore anyway.
