Biochemistry, Biophysics, and Structural Biology Commons^™

Changes In The Distribution Of Nesting Arctic Seaducks Are Not Strongly Related To Variation In Polar Bear Presence, Cody J. Dey, Christina A.D. Semeniuk, Samuel A. Iverson, H. Grant Gilchrist

Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research Publications

Contemporary climate change is predicted to expose some species to altered predation regimes. Losses of Arctic sea ice are causing polar bears to increasingly forage on colonial seaduck eggs in lieu of ice-based hunting of marine mammals. Although polar bear predation of bird eggs has now been widely documented, it is unclear whether this change in predator behavior is having population-level consequences for Arctic breeding birds. In this study, we tested whether changes in the number of common eider nests on 76 islands in Hudson Strait, Canada, were related to variation in polar bear presence. We found that polar bear …