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Polar Bears Find Sanctuary Near Alaskan Village
As climate change shrinks their natural habitat, polar bears are turning the Alaskan village of Kaktovik into their very own sanctuary city.
A young polar bear prepares to feast on the remains of a bowhead whale, harvested legally by whalers during their annual subsistence hunt, just outside the Inupiat village of Kaktovik, Alaska on Sept. 11, 2017.
The rise in global temperatures is having a very real, and very devastating, effect on Arctic ice formation, diminishing its scope and delaying its seasonal buildup. That scarcity means Alaskan polar bears can’t reach their traditional hunting grounds until later in fall.
Land-bound and hungry, 60 of these predators have learned to gather outside the village, feasting on the scraps from the annual hunt.