Over the past few weeks, a recurrent theme in the news has been the bizarre pollution-related animal story. Bees are abandoning their hives in swarms and ducks have been dying under mysterious circumstances - not to mention the polar bears.
Actually, not mentioning the polar bears turns out to be a major part of the Bush administration's plan for dealing with climate change, according to a memo sent to government biologists in the Fish and Wildlife Service last week.
Polar bears have been on American wildlife officials' minds lately, now that global warming has started causing Alaskan sea ice to retreat. The bears have been forced to change their hunting patterns, which means that they are passing much closer to Alaskan coastal villages. This change has led to more cases of bears injuring people, as well as more cases of people killing bears. In the long run, though, it is the polar bears that are in the greatest danger. Some scientists predict that by the end of the century the bears' sea ice will disappear completely in summer, leaving them unable to survive.
Last week, according to the New York Times, the Fish and Wildlife service circulated a memo for biologists and wildlife officials who are requesting permission to travel to Scandinavian countries. The memo suggests that permission will only be granted if the person applying for it "understands the administration's position on climate change, polar bears and sea ice and will not be speaking on or responding to these issues."
Now that the memo has been leaked to the public, of course, the countries that the officials will be visiting know all about the directive. The administration has backpedaled to the extent that the scientists can now discuss the polar bear situation "over a beer." That seems rather a pity; it would have been fun to imagine Scandinavian environmentalists cleverly tricking the hapless American scientists into saying the words "polar bear."
The polar bears are not the only creatures to stray from their usual haunts. In half the states in the country, a mass exodus of honeybees seems to be underway. Up to 70 percent of the bees that farmers depend on to pollinate their crops have been flying away from their hives and not returning.
Beekeepers are especially puzzled by the bees' tendency to abandon healthy hives with plenty of honey and pollen in them - the bee equivalent of leaving the house with the lights on, the dryer running and dinner on the table. One possible culprit is a new pesticide, which may be causing the bees to lose their sense of direction and die of cold or starvation because they cannot find their way home.
Another possible explanation is that the bees are "stressed out," a judgment that many people in the beekeeping industry seem to agree with, whether it explains what is happening. In order to meet the demands of American commercial farms, the bees have to be continually trucked around from place to place - treatment for which they are simply not designed. We may associate bees with unending work for its own sake, but apparently we are still capable of working them to death.
On the bright side, whatever killed 850 ducks in Colorado this winter seems to be slowing down, as ducks are turning up dead in much smaller numbers. Most of them were found near sewage treatment plants, where chemicals in the water stripped the waterproofing from their feathers. Without their natural protection against cold water, the ducks simply got wet and froze to death. The story has at least a partial happy ending - 40 ducks are being nursed at a sanctuary, and others have already been restored to health and released.
But while the news may have only depressing things to say about our treatment of all creatures great and small, there is always hope for all creatures robotic. Scientists have now invented a robot salamander to help them study how life on land evolved. The robot, which moves with the S-shaped wriggle of a real salamander, enjoys swimming and long walks on the beach - or at least is capable of both.
Given that scientists built a robot cockroach two years ago, these could be the first steps toward the creation of a full robot menagerie. Who knows? Perhaps the summer of 2100 will see robot polar bears off the coast of Alaska, swimming blithely around where the sea ice used to be.
Katy Crane '07 manages to mention salamanders in all her columns.
