Living With Polar Bears

Churchill is a destination. We're dubbed the polar bear capital of the world and, you know, making sure that we can coexist. The province of Manitoba has made it a regulation that there's no polar bear hunting in Manitoba, which we're proud of it. The murals that were painted on the various buildings throughout the community, they're a description of, for instance, beluga whales, polar bears. There is Miss Piggy there. She's an aircraft that went down in 1979. People of our community, I think we're all in, you know, in respect to the importance of the environment. I think there's a lot of pride in the community. You have a polar bear marathon along the coastal shores of the town of Churchill. We have the abundance of wildlife. Marathoners have seen bears along the way, so naturally we've got volunteers that are looking out for them. It's another way to come to the community. Marathon alongside the coast, alongside the polar bear habitat. It's a lot of fun. Well, these buggies, we're very proud to say, are made completely here in Churchill. We take the chassis from a retired fire truck. We have a 466 diesel international motor, Allison transmission, and welded aluminum. There's been many incarnations. We've come a long ways. And what we have now, we're very proud of. Let me tell you, when someone walks into my buggy, Buggy 17, and says, wow, luxurious, my heart swells. Hi, my name's Neil Mumby, and I'm a tundra buggy driver for Frontiers North. I've been doing this for nine years. Well, driving can be very interesting. The terrain's rather difficult. Expectations are always tough to achieve with buggy rides because we are dealing with wildlife. But I've had seven days without bears in nine years, so it's very rare to be skunked, as we say. But there's so many other things to see. Our arctic fox, our snowy owls, our deer falcon, possibly ermine. We've seen wolverine out here. I find people listen a little better when you have a little humor added in, and we're here on vacation. We're here to have a good time, so let's be part of it. The bears are incredible, each one being so unique. They're sleeping because it's stormy right now. They usually are on the leeward side of some snowdrifts or some willows. Every day is different. We're constantly working with polar bear experts from around the world who migrate here, much like the bears, and we can pick up a lot of knowledge from them, our guides, and our personal experiences. Today we were out on a tundra buggy in the Churchill Wildlife Management Area with Frontiers North on their big tundra buggies. It was an absolutely spectacular day today. We're here for the conservation of this species. We saw a mom with a yearling cub, and she was nursing that cub, and that kind of brings that message back home, that this is a really important conservation project for a species that's in a lot of trouble right now with climate change. So today was a really good day for us, a really solid day, and it gives us great perspective as we move forward now to the Knife Delta. So we're here on the coast of Hudson Bay, Canada. Where we are right now is about 25 miles from the nearest town of Churchill, Manitoba. To get out here, we flew out in a helicopter. The team was all transported out along with their gear. And then the cabin itself is about two miles from the spot where we're standing right now. So to get from the cabin out to here, we're actually taking an ATV with a trailer. It's a bit of a fun ride. You know, it's a little bit bouncy. But we get out here just fine to set up as close as possible to where we want to study the bears. We're right on the flow edge shelf of the bay, answering a very important conservation question. Right now, bears are hanging out on land, and they're waiting for the ice to form deeper in the bay so they can go back out to their home and start hunting seals. What we're seeing here in Hudson Bay is a change in the ice dynamics related to a warming climate. The ice is forming a lot later than it used to, and that's forcing bears to stay on land for longer. So we really want to look at this question in fine detail so that we can see when the bears are leaving and exactly what ice they need to understand what the prognosis is for this population as we go into the future. For me, nature is the greatest show on earth. And you know, we're collecting a lot of fantastic scientific information, but it's also good to just pause every now and then just to appreciate just what a beautiful and yet fragile landscape that we're operating in here. And the polar bear is just emblematic of just how this landscape's changing and how we all need to come together to conserve this iconic species and this habitat. The Churchill Northern Study Centre is located about 23 kilometres east of the town of Churchill, and we're located in the transition zone between the Arctic tundra and the boreal forest. We operate as a non-profit place for researchers to come and conduct their science, so we have lab facilities here. I've been working here at the Study Centre for the last 15 years as a science coordinator, and I really enjoy working at the Study Centre. It's a great place for researchers to come and also for the educational programs. We're also pretty much a one-stop shop, so we have accommodations and meals here, and we have a great observation deck for people to get out and be able to safely see the environment around. We have a number of training opportunities available for our staff, going out into the field and conducting vegetation data, for example. They're also involved in interfacing with the educational programs, so giving talks to different groups visiting the Study Centre. But they also have to bear guard or be trained as bear monitors here in Churchill. Bear guarding is mostly being good at observing your environment. Lots of hours standing in one spot, looking at the horizon for one of the largest terrestrial predators in the world. It can be a pretty tedious job at times, but you also have to stay on your toes and be awake. So usually polar bears stick out pretty good in the landscape here, summer and winter. They're not entirely white, as most people will think. They're more of a yellowy tinge. Not necessarily hard to see them, given that you have good visibility, and that's usually also a determining factor of where we go in the field, if we go in the field, what time we're out, what the weather's like. There's more factors like that that come into play than just being able to visibly spot them. As a researcher working in the field, we're often presented with this idea that we're coexisting with polar bears in their habitat. So we want to take care when we're out working in the field, or even when we're out as an individual, that we are prepared, and that we don't have to put the polar bears in any risky situation while we're out. Take a look around you and assess what those risks are. Here it's living close to wildlife, and I really enjoy working in this kind of habitat, not just for the polar bears, but for all the different kinds of wildlife. Don't go places with poor visibility. Preferably don't leave your car if you do see a bear. There's safety in numbers always with bears, and if you do see a bear, alert conservation officers immediately. The conditions in Churchill are really amazing. We go from bright, brilliant, sunny, hot summer days, and hot as like 30 degrees Celsius, to days like today where it's cold and blustery outside. It might be as cold as minus 40 or maybe minus 50 degrees Celsius with the wind chill. So it's such a wide range and varied range of conditions that we encounter here, and it's a really interesting place to work and to live as well. Churchill is my home. Churchill is a great place to be outside and play. Churchill is my work environment, and I love being a scientist here. Churchill is still a warm place because of the people that live here and the great community. Churchill is home. Bring your family and friends, and we'll all be happy. Churchill continues to coexist with polar bears and the abundance of wildlife that we have. For me, if we can't save the polar bear, then we can't save ourselves. If we lose polar bears, it won't only be a very different Arctic, but it'll be a very different planet for us all. It's sad for all of us if they go extinct, because it's just a warning to the rest of us.