Mollys Polar Bear Experience

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Mollys Polar Bear Experience
Written by Molly Alves 09
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This is a young male polar bear. When I took this
photo we were about five feet away from each
other. It was exhilarating!
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This is a mother and her two cubs, better known
to our group as MC-squared. I love this picture
because it looks like the cub is doing the
macarena.
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This is the adventurous cub of the two. He always
seemed to wander off while the other cub never
left its mothers side.
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This was my first view of the mother and cubs as
they walked right under the windows of our Tundra
Buggy.
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Here I am with a young male cleaning his paws in
the background. Notice that the water in the
background is not frozen. By this time in the
year the lakes should be frozen over by feet of
thick ice. This is one of the many affects of
global warming.
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What I am holding is a a mixture of mosses and
lichen. This is what the ground of the tundra
consists of. Under the mosses are layers of soil
and water so the terrain feels like a sort of
foamy trampoline when you walk on it.
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I took this picture from my helicopter of
another helicopter flying over the barren tundra.
Although the colors are dull it is a beautiful,
colorful region filled with magnificent wildlife.
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This is an abandoned polar bear den from the
previous season. We had the chance to enter the
den and look around the inside. I found it
amazing how this structure was scraped out of a
hillside by a pregnant mother bear.
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Words cannot begin to describe my experience,
living out on the tundra among the wild polar
bears. Seeing them, first hand, in their natural
habitat was truly an honor. Although my trip was
miraculous, it was not all bear hugs and smiles.
We learned from our many facilitators the affect
that global warming has on these bears and how it
has already begun to diminish their population.
There are only 20,000 bears remaining in the
entire world. You may think this is a large
number but did you know that bears are expected
to go extinct within the next decade? Because of
global warming the ice is not freezing over the
lakes and bays. The bears rely on the ice to
hunt, mate, and build dens for their cubs.
Without the ice there will be no polar bears. The
solution is simple. Turn off your light, unplug
your cell phone charger, plant a tree, ride a
bike rather than driving, or hand dry your dishes
(and hang your clothes to dry). All of these
simple actions reduce your carbon footprint. They
conserve oil, energy, and even money! I was sent
on this once-in-a-lifetime experience so that I
could absorb these facts like a sponge, return
home, and squeeze all of the information that I
retained out to you. I challenge every one of you
to spread my message to ten people and tell them
to do the same. Together, all of us doing these
small things that barely affect our daily lives,
we can save the polar bears.
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For More Information Visit
www.polarbearsinternational.org
www.rwpzoo.org
Molly Alves in Polar Bear Country