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The USGS conducts research on polar bears and has documented declines in their population. Survival rates and body size.
To better understand how sea ice decline in the Arctic affects polar bears,
USGS scientists are using accelerometers to gather data about the energy needed for the bears to hunt for food.
The scientists use accelerometers to track the polar bear movements like a Wii-fit video game controller tracks yours.
Since the accelerometer data are cryptic, USGS scientists are using captive bears in zoos to understand what the data mean.
I’m a research wildlife geologist for the U.S. Geological Survey and I’m here at the
San Diego zoo collecting accelerometer data from their adult female polar bear Tatiq.
And so the keepers here at the San Diego Zoo have been training Tatiq to wear a collar
for the last four months and slowly getting her acclimated to the collar .
And so now she’s able to wear the collar for about three hours a day without any issues.
She’s totally comfortable wearing the collar and she doesn’t seem phased at all wearing
it.
And so I’m here video taping her while she’s wearing this accelerometer collar
to calibrate the accelerometer data. Basically trying to understand what the accelerometer
data looks like for different behaviors.
So when Tatiq’s walking, what the accelerometer data looks like compared to
when she’s swimming versus resting versus eating, with the intent of actually applying
that information to accelerometer data we’re collecting from wild bears.
We’re attaching accelerometers to our GPS collars that we’re deploying on
wild polar bears in the Arctic
So this study should really help us get a better understanding of how polar bears are
actually responding to declines in sea ice and what the actual implications are for survival,
body condition and then start to look at how future forecasts for declines might impact
polar bears in the future.