07-Country research reports

Session 7. Country Research Reports

7.1 Polar bear research in Canada

Evan Richardson

The Canadian research presentation will provide an update on recent research conducted on polar bears since the last Range States Meeting of the parties, held virtually by Canada in fall 2023. The presentation reviews recent subpopulation assessment studies and work that has been conducted to understand the mechanisms driving changes in polar bear abundance and distribution. We detail how research on polar bear energetics, health, movement, behaviour, and genetics in Canada are helping inform the conservation and management of polar bears in a changing Arctic. Central to these conservation efforts is work to support knowledge sharing between communities, Indigenous organizations, provincial/territorial governments and the Government of Canada to support knowledge-based decision making for the long-term conservation of the species.

Norway Research Report (Jon Aars)

Work of den habitat and den phenology in Svalbard have been a priority the last 20 years. Polar Bears International and Norwegian Polar Institute had a project where den cameras monitored bear families in the first days or weeks after they broke the dens in spring, and until they left the area. A paper was published on den phenology in 2025.

Work on demography in cooperation with University of Montpellier/CEFE (Fr) led in November 2024 to a PhD. Among the more important results are how age of mother and size of cubs dictates litter production and cub survival.

Studies on exotoxicology maps prevalence of different pollutants inn polar bears over time. Current studies use live polar bear cell cultures where cells are exposed to pollutants, sampling and experiments took part in spring 2025, on board the NPI Research Vessel KPH.

Work on body condition among Svalbard polar bears show that despite loss of sea ice habitat, bear condition is still good, a paper is in revision.

Preliminary results on scooter traffic and polar bear activity show that female adults use the sea ice as much during the periods with highest traffic activity, and it does not seem like bears in more trafficked areas use sea ice less than in other areas, in spring.

Subcutaneous heart and temperature loggers were implanted in nine females that also had GPS-collars in spring 2024. Five of those were collected in spring 2025 and provided data for a year, on two denning females and three that were not denning. Data will be used in studies on energetics.

A project on reindeer-polar bear interactions is ongoing, and has already yielded a afir amount of data, including from Citizen science.

Data on both condition, reproductive data, and fat soluble pollutants are part of a long term monitor series (MOSJ, monitoring of Svalbard and Jan Mayen).

Part II of Russia’s Polar Bear Research Report

Belikov S.E. All-Russian Research Institute for Environmental Protection

Gnedenko A.E. Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences

Glazov D.M. Institute of Ecology and Evolution Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences

The work conducted from 2023 to 2025 by the All-Russian Research Institute for Environmental Protection, in collaboration with other scientific institutions, including the Institute of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences, was part of a comprehensive study and monitoring of polar bear subpopulations in the Russian Arctic. The goal of the study was to obtain up-to-date data on the status of these subpopulations to improve conservation and management measures.

In the Russian Arctic, the following key factors of anthropogenic impact on polar bears and their habitats are identified:

- Hydrocarbon development on the Arctic shelf.

- Intensification of the Northern Sea Route.

- Infrastructure development on the mainland coast and islands.

To minimize these factors, we considered mechanisms for maintaining the ecological balance of the ecosystems inhabited by polar bears. Various territorial and non-territorial (functional) conservation measures are used for the ecosystems inhabited by polar bear subpopulations. In the Russian Arctic, territorial protection of polar bears and their main prey - ringed seals, bearded seals, and walruses - is implemented both in federal, regional, and locally designated specially protected natural areas (SPNAs), as well as outside of these SPNAs. Some Arctic SPNAs encompass not only land but also marine waters, which contributes to the protection of marine ecosystems and the organisms inhabiting them, including these species. Areas with varying occurrences of these species outside of SPNAs have been identified (observation period 1952-2022), and a set of practical measures for actively managing anthropogenic impacts on marine and coastal ecosystems in areas of increased occurrence, which we consider to be of particular ecological significance, have been recommended.

At the request of the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources, the All-Russian Research Institute for Environmental Protection is collecting and compiling a database of conflict situations involving polar bears. The aim of the study is to identify methods for more effectively managing conflicts and minimizing the risk of injury or death to both humans and polar bears. Areas with the highest number of human-polar bear conflicts in 2025 have been identified.

The All-Russian Research Institute for Environmental Protection is conducting modeling and mapping studies to identify potentially suitable habitats for breeding female polar bears to establish dens on islands and in the coastal zone of the Russian Arctic. From 2023 to 2025, this study was conducted on the Novaya Zemlya and New Siberian Islands archipelagos. Recommendations have been developed to reduce potential negative anthropogenic impacts on these habitats.

U.S. Research Presentation Summary

Speaker: Todd Atwood, Polar Bear Research Program Lead, U.S. Geological Survey

This presentation summarizes the United States' collaborative polar bear research efforts in the Southern Beaufort Sea and Chukchi Sea regions from 2023 to 2025. The research, conducted by multiple organizations, covers several key areas: population dynamics, spatial ecology, habitat mapping, methods development, and hazards assessment.

We describe how research findings are applied to sustainably manage polar bear populations while balancing the economic development of Alaska’s Arctic Coastal Plain. Collectively, this work has improved our understanding of the status and health of the Southern Beaufort Sea and Chukchi Sea populations. These efforts, which include those carried out jointly by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and the Alaska Nannut Co-Management Council (ANCC), the Service’s Alaska Native co-management partner, reflect a continued commitment to conserving polar bears while supporting the subsistence needs and cultural well-being of Indigenous communities across Alaska’s Arctic coast.