Filed under: Climate Change, Plants and Wildlife

It's been one of the coldest and snowiest winters on record on the East Coast, but here in San Francisco we've been lucky enough to escape with a few frigid, rainy days.

Not everyone appreciates our temperate weather. Some residents probably wish we'd get more of the white stuff, including the three polar bears who live at the San Francisco Zoo.

Two of the bears, Pike (pronounced PEE-KA), and Andy, (who is the star of the popular children's book "Andy Bear,") got a special holiday surprise the week before Christmas, courtesy of the San Francisco Ice Company: snow!

The San Francisco Ice Company donated ten tons of ice, which the zoo chipped into snowflakes for the polar bears. Pike and Andy got to celebrate the first day of winter by rolling around in the icy fun.

Polar bears are so well adapted to living in cold weather that they actually have a much harder time dealing with warm weather, easily becoming dehydrated. Their habitat is the Arctic, with over 60% of the world's 20,000 to 25,000 polar bears living in Canada.

The species has been hit especially hard by climate change, with melting polar ice changing their habitat on a nearly daily basis. The greatest challenge is that without ice they can't hunt seals, their primary source of food.

Polar bears are listed as "threatened" on the Endangered Species list, and many experts believe their numbers will continue to decline as global warming continues to change the landscape of the Arctic.

For now, polar bears in captivity, like Pike and Andy, help us understand the breed and their habitats. And we can thank them for this education in little ways, like giving them an occasional snow day!

Polar Bear Snow Day at the San Francisco Zoo originally appeared on Green Daily on Tue, 19 Jan 2010 12:02:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

 

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Filed under: Travel and Vacation, Activism, Climate Change

Caution -- video is graphic, and you don't want kids to see this!

Holiday travel often means flying across the country, sometimes just for a day or two so that you can see family. But gone are the days of glamorous flights. Today it's expensive, uncomfortable, and a huge hassle to get through security.

Not to mention it's bad for the environment, right? Prepare to feel eco-guilt if you're flying this holiday season -- even if you did your TerraPass. The anti-flying group Plane Stupid made this video of polar bears falling from the sky to graphically demonstrate how much carbon is dumped into the atmosphere when you fly.

In case you miss the symbolism, the video ends with this:
"An average European flight produces over 400kg of greenhouse gases for every passenger. That's the weight of an adult polar bear."

This video is not for the faint of heart, and definitely don't watch it during lunch! It's not pretty when a polar bear crashes into the ground from a great height.

I'm fairly certain that Plane Stupid didn't drop real polar bears from the sky, mostly because I don't think they'd charter a plane -- it would be antithetical to their mission. However, they are wacky enough to invest money is some seriously realistic looking CGI to prove their point. Those animated polar bears look like they are suffering!

Even though many of us try to buy carbon offsets, many more don't. And even with the best of intentions, when you're on a tight budget it's easy to skip that expense and say, "Well, I'll double up next time."

Get ready to go back and double up this time! After seeing this video, I'm half ready to walk across the country instead of flying!

Plane Stupid Drops Polar Bears to Protest Flying originally appeared on Green Daily on Tue, 24 Nov 2009 12:03:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

 

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