By bethanylindsay

Bethany Lindsay is a Master of Journalism candidate at UBC's School of Journalism. In a previous life, she was an intrepid biologist, but has abandoned tracking down lizards for tracking down leads.

THAWING OUT NORTHERN MAMMALS

For mammals in the northern regions of the world, global warming must seem a little more real than it does to humans below the Arctic Circle. In 2004, the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment released a report called Impacts of a Warming Climate that revealed dire and immediate consequences of climate change for species ranging from polar bears to seals [1]. Temperatures in the Arctic are increasing at twice the rate of the rest of the world, according to the report. Sea ice is rapidly melting and breaking up at a rate of about 3% per decade[2], winters are shortening, and…