Pet Knows

It’s been a question on the minds of many humans during the past few years - how will global warming affect our every day lives? Well, here at PetKnows we are starting to ask ourselves - how could global warming affect our four, two and slippery-legged friends?

It seems that the Department of Interior this week has answered part of the question by putting Polar Bears on the list of Endangered Species. Other endangered species include: manatees, whooping cranes, piping plovers, the Houston Toad and many others.

Polar Bears are now the first species to be granted protection under the Endangered Species Act due to the effects of global warming. Polar Bears will now gain protection from being targeted for sport - yes, as hard as it is for us pet lovers to believe - some people do hunt polar bears commercially and sell them as living room trophies.

The only unfortunate thing is that while global warming is well, a global problem, just putting Polar Bears on the ESA in the United States does not guarantee that they willl be completely safe. The ESA will stop the sport hunting of polar bears in Alaska, but often trophy hunters skirt the United States conservation law by killing polar bears abroad.

According to Animals and Politics Blog, hunting groups like the Safari Club International make it hard to protect beautiful species like the Polar Bear due to their competitive “Bears of the World” hunting achievement award, given to individuals who shoot four of the eight species of bears in the world (gasp!). This awards program drives competitive killing of Polar Bears. The Safari Club lobby has also thwarted previous government action on the issue, and according to Michael Markarian, the president of the Humane Society Legislative Fund, “most of the trophy hunters who chase these animals in the Arctic in a head-hunting exercise are Americans.”

As Congress continues to work on restoring the longstanding ban on polar bear imports, we should celebrate the decision this week to put the Polar Bear on the ESA, and hope that Congress also passes the Polar Bear Protection Act:

Bill Number: S. 1406 & H.R. 2327
Bill Status: Pending
HSUS Position: Support
Bill Sponsor(s): Sens. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), Olympia J. Snowe (R-Maine) and Jack Reed (D-RI)
Reps. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) and Frank LoBiondo (R-NJ)
Legislature Status: In Session