Emails from the edge: Svalbard's polar bears are sending messages to scientists
By Temujin Doran, Max Burnell and Tom Page, CNN
Updated 1756 GMT (0156 HKT) December 9, 2020
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(CNN)Polar bears take some cajoling as pen pals. First you need to find one, then sedate it and quickly give it the necessary tools before it wakes up. It's an awkward first encounter -- how many friendships do you know that start with a tranquilizer dart? -- and admittedly a one-sided correspondence, but soon they're sending messages daily.
Every morning, Jon Aars, a senior researcher at the Norwegian Polar Institute, receives a batch of emails from several female polar bears in the High Arctic, checking in and letting him know where they are. "It's always a nice way to start the day," he says.
Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago north of the mainland, is an ideal place for Aars to study a section of the world's estimated 26,000 remaining polar bears. "(There are) about 300 living in Svalbard year-round," he explains, "if you fly for one hour, most of the time you find one."
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/12/09/europe/polar-bears-svalbard-jon-aars-norwegian-polar-institute-spc-intl-c2e/
