Churchill is the small town of Manitoba on the banks of Western Hudson Bay.
Here, the sea meets the borial forest under the wave of northern lights. To the north, trees stop growing. Snow coat a rigid landscape of the Canadian Shield, and continuously cut the air through the willow.
No road goes towards Churchill. Just carry a railway line and runway of an airport, sometimes charter aircraft.
But this attracts tourists and scientists equally because for a short time in the fall, the kings of the Arctic migrate through the city in their homes on frozen sea ice. Passengers come here, from all over the world, look for one thing: to close eyes with a polar bear.
Bear
Polar bears through churchill through churchill through every autumn they wait for ice on the bay. Male first takes on ice, take out the edges and test, eager to travel north where they can eventually hunt for ringed seals – their primary food sources.
Scientists converge in churchill as it is the most accessible point to study polar bears. The bears here have been the most researched in the world, and the most photographed.
These Arctic animals have large personality: they play and nap to spend time. Male will often sprinkle, trying to know each other so that they are ready for the battle charged in the spring during the intercourse.
The cubs stay close to their mothers for two to three years, before they are chasing and are forced to live on their own. For the next year, they test water – sometimes struggle to survive because they learn to hunt and maintain themselves in Tundra.
“A clear change in the ecosystem”
In recent years, however, the warming has melted its habitat on the Arctic ice, changing the bear’s behavior: the scientists in the Polar Beer International say the ice is making two weeks later compared to the 1980s, and resumed two weeks ago in the spring.
The change of this month in their environment is forcing the bear to stay for a long time, close to humans and away from the seal layer in the north.
This is a change – sparked by transformational climate – that their parents and grandparents did not face. Yes, the bears are constantly developing, since they disintegrated from the grizzly about 500,000 years ago, but the pace of change is dangerous to scientists.
The main climate scientist for Polar Beer, International Flavio Lehanar, says that due to the decline in sea ice, the polar bear population in Western Hudson Bay is less than 618, it was about half in the 1980s.
“It’s quite deep,” they say. “It is difficult to find other places, perhaps in addition to those who have been deprived of Amazon, where you see such a clear change in the ecosystem caused by climate change.”
Lehner does not estimate that the situation will improve, and beyond the decline in the population, he is also looking at a practical change. It used to be very special to find mothers with triple, which in their personal experience, now rare.
Scientists at Polar Beer International say that these bears can maintain themselves comfortably on the ground for 180 days. In other parts of the world, the bear is seen hunting birds and deer, but scientists say that this high-protein diet can damage their kidneys, and when they are away from snow, they do not stop losing 2-4 pounds.
PBI’s chief research scientist John Whitman said, “The current pace of change is going on very fast.” “Polar bears will not be able to develop on time to be able to deal with our current rate of sea ice loss.”
Whitman hopes that the polar bear will stick around the next 10 years or churchill, but in the future, the timeline for 20 to 30 years starts to fade.
“We eventually know if we lose sea ice, we lose polar bears,” said Whitman.
The town
Churchill has always been a city. It is living many lives – from home to first nation from the military city to the pillar bear capital from the military city.
It attracts a particular type of person. Often one who enjoys in solitude. Those who come for employment are a worker of semi-goliar tourist industry, or perhaps they are looking for a change. They are enthusiastic to guide and nature, seasonal activists are attracted to the slow, simple speed of life.
Other – such as Mayor Mike Spenses of 30 -year -old city, spent their lives here. When he was a child, the Protection Officer in the city was shooting 20 to 22 bears a year. But over time, the approach has changed.
“First, we respect wildlife,” they say. “Polar bears are quite important in the indigenous world – it is at the top of its food chain. It has great respect.”
The city is now facing a future where the polar bear tourist weather may be potentially disappeared. In the interim, the community will be forced to bring more closely with the bear to co -existence as they wait for ice to be formed on the bay. And as the infrastructure also struggles to be suited to a warming climate and to melt the permafrost, Spens is one of the many people who are looking for a solution.
“We have always been challenged,” says Spens. But the community also “usually find a way.”
The solutions include taking command of a port and railway line that collapsed in 2017 due to a combination of flood and maintenance lack. Once it starts working with its full potential, it is expected that it will welcome more consistent jobs and resources for the community. Meanwhile, a new program in the city increases microgrance, and new polar bears-resistant garbage containers dott on roads, for all people to pursue a permanent route and wildlife in the north.
Spens says, “What we need to do now is growing here on our youth, so that they play a big role in building a strong community and a large community.” “They see for themselves what they have found is very valuable.”
Fight for future
On the outskirts of the city, Wayet Daily gave hooks to their sled dogs, preparing to lead three tourism for the day. Fall is a peak tourist season, and he will spend the day among the trees of borial forest on snow.
Churchill depends on the tourism that comes from those wishing to see the polar bear. To maintain their businesses, some tourism companies want to pive to protect their futures.
One of these methods is advertising other aspects of this wild answer – Arora who dances 300 nights of the year and dances annual Beluga whale in summer.
But this is not just an economic engine that needs to be fuel: there is a yearning for families and to choose the next generation Churchill, to do it and taste what to present.
Visht Daily was one of the children who had begging their parents to move forward in the south years ago. His father Dave, a dog Musher and the owner of the tourism company, shake their heads and tell them, “We have dogs, this is where we make our life.” And it was the end of that special conversation.
He saw his friends and their families away – especially in the middle school years – the discovery of “better opportunities”. After graduation, he traveled worldwide, working in the tourism industry in Australia and Cologne. But he came home. Back to dogs, and back to churchill.
Churchill, they say, given him “everything”. He feels related to dogs, ground. His father is his best friend. And exactly the same he wants for his son Noah – now 3 years old – which is also a affinity for dogs.
“I remember I was a small child and stood on the back ski with my father and was touring,” he says. “This is what I am looking forward to. I think of (Noah) and am touring with me.”
But this heritage is threatened by the warming arctic, and it is a weight that delis feels because they fight in the north to protect their way of life.
Dave Daily says, “There is a scary idea to think that polar bears cannot be here one day.” “The planet Earth is a living creature, and we are spreading over it and everything is changing. I think we really need to get a handle on it and start taking it seriously.”
