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GLOBAL WARMING AND WILDLIFE 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON PRIVATE SECTOR 

AND CONSUMER SOLUTIONS TO 

GLOBAL WARMING AND WILDLIFE 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

FEBRUARY 7, 2007 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress.senate 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

BARBARA BOXER, California, Chairman 

MAX BAUCUS, Montana 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, New York 

FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota 

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia 

DAVID VITTER, Louisiana 

JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming 

LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho 

LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee 

CHRISTOPHER S. BOND, Missouri 

BETTINA POIRIER, Majority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

ANDREW WHEELER, Minority Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON PRIVATE SECTOR AND CONSUMER SOLUTIONS TO GLOBAL

WARMING AND WILDLIFE PROTECTION

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut, Chairman 

MAX BAUCUS, Mantana 

FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

BARBARA BOXER, California (ex officio) 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming 

JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma (ex officio) 
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C O N T E N T S 

Page 

FEBRUARY 7, 2007 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

Boxer, Hon. Barbara, U.S. Senator from the State of California ........................ 4 

Inhofe, Hon. James M., U.S. Senator from the State of Oklahoma .................... 5 

Isakson, Hon. Johnny, U.S. Senator from the State of Georgia .......................... 7 

Lieberman, Hon. Joseph I., U.S. Senator from the State of Connecticut ........... 1 

Warner, Hon. John, U.S. Senator from the Commonwealth of Virginia ............. 3 

WITNESSES 

Foote, A. Lee, Associate Professor, University of Alberta .................................... 14 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 41 

Kelly, Brendan P., Associate Vice President for Research, University of 

Alaska ................................................................................................................... 17 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 44 

Lovejoy, Thomas E., President, Heinz Center for Science, Economics and 

the Environment .................................................................................................. 8 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 35 

Mann, Roger, Director for Research and Advisory Services, School of Marine 

Science, Virginia Institute of Marine Science, College of William and Mary . 10 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 37 

Stalling, David H., Western Field Coordinator, Trout Unlimited ....................... 12 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 39 

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL 

Letters: 

Association of Fish & Wildlife Agencies ......................................................... 112 

Scientists and Evangelicals ............................................................................. 108 

Sportsmen and Wildlife conservation groups ................................................. 114 

Statements: ..............................................................................................................

Clark, Jamie Rappaport, Executive Vice President, Defenders of Wildlife . 46 

International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) .............................. 104 

National Wildlife Federation, Nationwide Opinion, Survey of Hunters 

and Anglers, March/April 2006 .................................................................... 87 

Schweiger, Larry J., President & CEO, National Wildlife Federation ........ 61 

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service ........................................................................ 129 

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GLOBAL WARMING AND WILDLIFE 

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 2007 

U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS, SUBCOMMITTEE ON PRIVATE SECTOR AND CONSUMER

SOLUTIONS TO GLOBAL WARMING AND WILDLIFE PROTECTION, 

Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:00 a.m. in room 

406, Dirksen Senate Office Building, the Hon. Joseph Lieberman 

(chairman of the committee) presiding. 

Present: Senators Lieberman, Warner, Boxer, Inhofe, Isakson, 

Alexander 

OPENING STATEMENT OF THE HON. JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Good morning, and welcome to this first 

hearing of the Subcommittee on Private Sector and Consumer Solutions to Global Warming and Wildlife Protection. 

It is my honor to convene this first hearing. In doing so, I want 

to thank the Chairman of the overall Committee on Environment 

and Public Works, Senator Boxer, for creating this subcommittee 

focused on these challenges. It is a measure of her commitment and 

I think the committee’s, on a bipartisan basis, to get something 

done, and particularly to seize the moment and the momentum 

that is building across our country and in most importantly, in the 

world of science and scientific inquiry and conclusion that global 

warming is real and that we have got to do something about it to 

protect ourselves and those who will follow us here on Earth. 

I am very happy and honored that Senator Warner has agreed 

to become the ranking Republican on this subcommittee. He is a 

dear friend, a great Senator and I know wants to go forward and 

see if we can get some things done. I thank the other members who 

are here, Senator Inhofe, the ranking Republican on the overall 

committee, and Senator Isakson. 

Last Friday, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 

known generally as the IPCC, issued its most recent report, in 

which it found a greater than 90 percent probability, this is the 

language of science, but this number has gone up dramatically in 

each of the IPCC reports, more than 90 percent probability that 

greenhouse gases release by human activities, such as burning coal 

in power plants or using gasoline from oil in our cars and trucks, 

have caused most of the global warming observed over the last 50 

years. If we fail to reduce our emissions of greenhouse gases now, 

or as soon as possible, the report says, the global average surface 
2 

air temperature will rise by 3 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit by the end 

of this century. That is an astounding number, an enormous jump 

in global temperatures, which has reached the point where it is 

comprehensible by us non-scientists, to see how significant the potential changes are here. 

As a result, according to the IPCC, sea levels will rise, snow 

cover will contract and sea ice will recede. Heat waves will become 

more frequent, hurricanes and typhoons will become more intense 

and rainfall will become less frequent in the sub-tropics. I don’t 

read this report as a plea for panic, but it certainly is a summons 

to action, and quickly. The purpose of today’s hearing is to build 

on our knowledge of the impacts, real and potential, of global 

warming on wildlife in different regions of this country and the 

world, to see how climate change is already having an effect on the 

species and what further impacts the experts we have before us 

would expect if the IPCC, based on the IPCC report. 

Let me just give you as one recent example, just 2 months ago, 

within the last 2 months, the Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife 

Service has identified a warming climate and the resulting melting 

of sea ice as the primary reason polar bears may now be threatened as a species and may in fact be endangered, as a matter of 

law. We will hear today that the polar bear is not the only species 

so endangered by the warming of the globe, and that Arctic is not 

the only region of the world with such climate-sensitive species. 

I must say that the diversity of voices in this country, not talking 

about the world, expressing concern about the harm done to wildlife by global warming, is striking and impressive. A poll conducted 

last spring by the National Wildlife Federation found that 67 percent of hunters and anglers in this country believe global warming 

is an urgent problem requiring immediate action. Seventy-five percent believe Congress should pass legislation that sets a clear national goal for reducing global warming pollution with mandatory 

time lines. 

I am going to ask unanimous consent to put that National Wildlife Federation report into the record. 

[The referenced material can be found on page 87.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Last month, prominent evangelical leaders 

in this country, including the Rev. Richard Cizik of the National 

Association of Evangelicals and the Rev. Jim Ball of the Evangelical Environmental Network signed a statement asserting that 

the earth is ‘‘seriously imperiled by human behavior,’’ that is a 

quote, and ‘‘the harm is seen throughout the natural world, including in the form of global warming.’’ 

The IPCC’s new assessment finds that greenhouse gases we have 

emitted over the past decades will inevitably cause some global 

warming. There is no stopping it. When Congress hopefully soon 

enacts legislation to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, the legislation will, I hope, include measures designed to help wildlife species deal with the changes that are now unavoidable, while obviously reducing greater changes in the future. 

The bill that I recently re-introduced with Senator McCain and 

others includes such measures. I believe we can make these provisions even stronger, and I look forward to working with my col-
3 

leagues, as well as sportsmen, sportswomen, wildlife conservation 

advocates and academic experts to do so. 

I do want to put in the record a letter from 375 sportsmen and 

wildlife conservation groups, asking that funding for fish and wildlife protection and conservation be included in any global warming 

legislation, as well as a letter from the Association of Fish and 

Wildlife Agencies of our country, supporting the provisions in our 

bill that allocate funds from auctioned emission allowances to help 

fish and wildlife adapt to the warming of the globe that the IPCC 

now tells us is unavoidable. 

[The referenced letter can be found on page 114.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. I really look forward to working with my fellow members of this subcommittee and the overall committee to see 

if we can’t find bipartisan, non-partisan common ground to begin 

to take action and assume responsibility for a problem that it certainly seems to me we are causing. I thank all the witnesses who 

are here, and I look forward to hearing their testimony. 

At this point, I would invite Senator Warner to make an opening 

statement. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF THE HON. JOHN WARNER, U.S. 

SENATOR FROM THE COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA 

Senator WARNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would be happy 

to defer to my distinguished colleague, the ranking member, and I 

want to thank you, Senator Inhofe, for honoring my request, which 

is the only one I made to the committee, and that is to serve on 

this Subcommittee. If you would like to proceed, I will follow you. 

Senator INHOFE. You go ahead. 

Senator WARNER. I will just ask to include in the record my 

opening statement and maybe make a personal observation. 

I come to this issue, I would have to tell you, uninformed, and 

with an open and an objective mind, to learn about it. I don’t claim 

to be an expert in this area. But I have an intense interest. You 

said something about the sportsmen. I have to tell you, my personal habits are, when I can’t go to sleep, I reach over and get either my magazine on Trout Unlimited or one of my shooting volumes to read, and then I can quietly go to sleep. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator WARNER. And my lovely wife and I just rehabbed our 

house, we bought a house that needed substantial rehab. And I 

soon recognized that I was going to have almost no voice whatsoever in what was to be done. But I did prevail on one thing, and 

that is in our library, I finally got the gun case I always wanted, 

with glass panels. And in it is a shotgun given to me by my father 

when I was 12 years old. And to give you a point in time, I will 

be 80 in 2 weeks. That gun has seen some action. 

Anyway, I love the outdoors, and I cherish the moments I am 

with my grandchildren now, sharing the simple joys of fishing and 

hunting that I had with my wonderful father and others in years 

past. So I feel an obligation to make this work. 

Lastly, of all of our hearings, I don’t know, this will be the one 

I perhaps look forward to the most, because I am interested in this. 

I just simply say this. There is such controversy out here that it 

is really a challenge for this subcommittee to try and plow through 
4 

that and find the solid factual base on which any conclusions that 

the Congress may make has to rest. In doing that, I observe one 

thing, with no disrespect to anyone in the audience, with their particular constituency they are representing, the wildlife and the 

plant species are not represented by any lobbyist. And how they 

react to today’s climate is a pure, clear science. It could well provide the benchmarks, the indicators, the early indicators of what 

direction our Nation and a collective group of nations must move 

to solve this problem. 

So long live the wildlife and the plant life and I am anxious to 

hear what you have to say. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Senator Warner. Congratulations 

in that small victory in the ongoing spousal disputes that we all 

have. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. And may I say, I believe I speak for everyone in the room, I certainly speak for myself, that I hope I am looking and doing as well as you are when I approach 80. God bless 

you. 

Senator Boxer. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF THE HON. BARBARA BOXER, U.S. 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Senator BOXER. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman, and I am 

very pleased at the makeup of this subcommittee, and pleased that 

you and Senator Warner are launching this early hearing. 

Today, we address a very important topic as we continue to consider global warming and its impact on our planet, particularly 

global warming’s effect on wildlife, and I won’t go over the IPCC 

report, because I think Senator Lieberman laid it out very clearly. 

But I think it is important to note that that report was 3 years 

in the making was, 1,200 scientists directly involved. If you consider all the scientists, it was about 2,500 for more than 100 countries, including the United States of America. As a matter of fact, 

the Bush administration took credit, in large part, for the report, 

said that they had been very much in the lead in putting it together. 

Now, the catastrophic effects that are discussed in the report including melting of Arctic ice, rising sea levels, destruction of coral 

reefs, deadly heat waves, increases in extreme weather events, negative impacts on food production and water supplies, and many 

other dangerous impacts that can affect our national security, our 

economic security and, as Senator Warner pointed out, our qualify 

of life with our families. 

While the impacts on humans will be severe if we don’t act, and 

of course, I am an optimist and I believe we will act, the impacts 

on wildlife and endangered species can be equally devastating if we 

don’t act to curb global warming. Because if the earth continues to 

warm, many animals will find themselves living under conditions 

for which they are not well adapted, and many of these species are 

already under great pressure from development and other human 

activities. Global warming could magnify those effects many times 

over. The affected wildlife could include many game species that 
5 

are both culturally and economically important to us in a variety 

of ways. 

I just want to show you three charts. I love charts. The first one 

is the statement of Secretary of the Interior Kempthorne: ‘‘We are 

concerned the polar bears’ habitat may be literally melting.’’ He 

said that December 27, 2006, when he acted to consider whether 

the polar bear really is a threatened species. 

And then I want to show you just two pictures of the many I 

have, but I culled it down to two, showing the polar bear, just 

needs that ice to be solid, that one. And then this next one. 

Global warming’s impacts on wildlife do not just affect individual 

species. They have a tremendous impact on our economy. And I 

think that is important, because people say, well, what is the cost 

of stopping global warming? Well, what is the cost of doing nothing? I think we have heard from the economists in the Stern Review that it is a huge cost, and that a dollar that we invest today 

will save $5.00 in the future. 

My home State of California is one of the most biologically diverse regions of the planet, because of the number of climates and 

ecosystems on its borders. From sports fishing on the north coast 

of California to big game viewing in the Sierra Nevada, this biodiversity is one of the most valuable natural resources helping our 

fragile rural economies. In 2001, more than 7.2 million people spent nearly $5.7 billion 

on wildlife viewing, hunting and fishing in California, directly supporting 114,000 jobs. In short, biodiversity is big enjoyment for our 

families. It is also big business. 

So curbing global warming will save thousands of California jobs, 

maintain many important industries and maintain the quality of 

life for our families. I am very eager to hear the testimony of this 

distinguished panel, and I would say to my friends who are heading this committee, Senators Lieberman and Warner, thank you so 

much. There is a conflicting hearing on global warming in the Commerce Committee on which I serve, so I may be running back and 

forth. But I am just so pleased that you took the time out of your 

hectic schedules to look at this issue. Thank you. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks very much, Senator Boxer. 

Senator Inhofe, we appreciate your taking the time to be here 

this morning. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF THE HON. JAMES M. INHOFE, U.S. 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA 

Senator INHOFE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I don’t 

have this as a part of my opening statement, but I want to respond 

to a couple of things that have been said in the opening statements. 

First of all, the IPCC report that is out, was out last Friday, is 

not the report, that is the summary for policy makers. It is not the 

scientists. That report comes out some time in May or June. 

Interestingly enough, even in the summary, they stated that in 

terms of the sea level rising, that has been reduced by 50 percent 

from 36 feet, I believe, to 17 feet. They also said that they have 

downgraded the contribution, Senator Boxer, of man’s contribution 

to global warming or to climate change by 25 percent. This comes 
6 

from IPCC in just the summary for policy makers. And they also 

state that livestock now is producing more of the gases that would 

affect climate, if you were to buy into it, than human beings. 

And as far as the evangelistic organization goes, I am sure that 

neither of you are aware of this, but the Richard Cizik you refer 

to is on his own, and I am sure he is being well rewarded for doing 

it, he has been rejected by the National Association of Evangelicals. 

So I just wanted to mention those little corrections. 

I think it goes without saying that the earth has experienced climate change that has affected species. The concern I continue to 

voice is the leap of faith that human beings are responsible for any 

variation in climate or that species will go extinct if we don’t regulate greenhouse gases. Animals are fun and fuzzy and I love them 

and obviously they can be used to advance another agenda. 

The fact is that the relationship between species and climate is 

not clearly understood. Our growing knowledge about the planet is 

still in its infancy. For example, just last year we discovered for the 

first time a great discovery, and that was that trees emit methane. 

Methane is a form of greenhouse gas. This was never thought of 

before and it never entered into any of the models that have been 

used. 

Our lack of understanding doesn’t stop some from trying to force 

linkages between climate change and species, as is the case with 

the proposal to list the polar bear under the Endangered Species 

Act. Based on the scientific literature, I don’t believe we have a 

firm understanding of what is actually occurring in the Arctic. Sea 

ice data is incomplete for one of the most important Arctic climate 

variables, precipitation and evaporation. 

The Arctic climate impact assessment found, and I am quoting 

now from the Arctic climate impact assessment, uncertainties concerning even the present day distribution of precipitation and evaporation are sufficiently large that evaluations of recent variations 

in trends are problematic. So how can we predict future trends and 

their impact on polar bears if we don’t—they just handed me this. 

We were talking about Richard Cizik a minute ago, and the fact 

that he has been discredited. If you don’t believe this, read the recent article that just came out on him called Feeling the Heat. 

Anyway, as far as the polar bear data, this is kind of interesting, 

Mr. Chairman, because there are 19 populations of polar bears 

around. I think we all understand that. Of the 19 populations, 14 

are either stable or are increasing. There is no evidence of decline 

in those. 

Now, overall, and this is very significant, I say to my good friend, 

and she is a good friend, Senator Boxer, is that since the 1950s and 

1960s, the polar bear population has more than doubled. It has 

gone up from 10,000 to 25,000. The Fish and Wildlife Service base 

their listings on entire polar bear populations on data from a single 

population. This happens to be in western Hudson Bay. The population has declined some 22 percent, they are saying, in the past 

17 years. 

However, hunting is accountable for 460 of the bears. Now, that 

is based on a 5-year average. So if you take that, that amount is 

equal or more than equal to the decline in population over a 17- 
7 

year period. So that has to be something that is one of the considerations. 

I believe the proposal to list the polar bear, and more broadly, 

to link climate changes and species is part of an effort to alter energy policy and shut down development, not just in Alaska, but 

across the Nation. This agenda was made clear just last week when 

the Center for Biological Diversity filed a petition asking seven 

Federal agencies, including the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and 

the National Marine Fisheries Service, to consider the potential effects of global warming on species when undertaking any major action, such as highway construction or energy permitting. It is clear 

that environmentalists are seeking to use America’s love for wildlife as a way to bring about climate changes that they can’t get 

through science alone. 

You know, I think it is very important to understand also that 

those of us who are, who question, in fact, right now, more of the 

scientists who are lined up, as we will bring out in some of the 

questions later on, marching in the aisles and saying it is manmade gases are now coming around and saying that it is not the 

case. 

Claude Allegre is a good example, from France. He was member 

of both the French and American Academy of Sciences. He is a geophysicist. And he was one of the strongest promoters in France 

that it was man-made gases causing climate change. He has now 

come around and he said, no, the science does not support that any 

longer. And I can name scientist after scientist who has come to 

this conclusion. They say it is really all about money. That is what 

Claude Allegre said. And I think there is a lot of money in this 

issue, a lot of money. 

Lastly, it is true as we go through, we know about the little ice 

age and the Medieval warming period. We know what happened 

starting in the middle 1940s in terms of the heating that took place 

at that time, up through about 1975, from about 1950 to 1975. And 

at that time, all the magazines who are now talking about the 

world is coming to end because of global warming were saying another ice age is coming and we are all going to die. 

So with that, thank you for having this hearing. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you very much, Senator Inhofe. 

Senator Isakson, welcome to the Subcommittee. It is the first 

chance I have had to publicly thank you for the great representation you give my children and grandchildren who live in Georgia. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF THE HON. JOHNNY ISAKSON, U.S. 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF GEORGIA 

Senator ISAKSON. I am delighted to do it, Mr. Chairman. I am 

honored to be here. In light of the subject and the previous statements, I will not take time away from the panel, except to associate 

myself with the remarks of Senator Warner. I thought he made an 

excellent statement. I think I come to the meeting in the same way 

that he does, with an open mind, seeking unvarnished and unbiased fact in an issue that has an awful lot of both. So I appreciate 

Senator Warner’s statement, I appreciate the panelists being here 

today. I thank the Chairman for letting me have a moment. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you, Senator Isakson. 
8 

Now we will go to our witnesses. We have an outstanding panel, 

it is the only panel that the hearing will hear. I know I speak for 

myself and the whole subcommittee when I say we are really looking forward to listening and learning and then asking some questions. 

The first witness is Dr. Thomas Lovejoy, who is Director of the 

Heinz Center for Science, Economic sand the Environment. He has 

served on science and environmental councils and committees in 

the Reagan, Bush and Clinton Administrations. He is the originator of the concept of debt-for-nature swaps and created the public 

television series, Nature. He is the author of several books, including one on climate change and biodiversity. 

Dr. Lovejoy, it is a pleasure to welcome you and to see you again. 

STATEMENT OF THOMAS E. LOVEJOY, PRESIDENT, HEINZ 

CENTER FOR SCIENCE, ECONOMICS AND THE ENVIRONMENT 

Mr. LOVEJOY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and committee members, for the opportunity to share my testimony on climate change 

and the world of nature. It has been a subject I have been following 

for two decades. I have done two books on it, brought the second 

one for the committee, along with the scientific citations behind the 

main points in my testimony. 

Between the first book and the second book, which came out 2 

years ago, the difference is that one can definitely see signals in 

nature of plants and animal species and populations responding to 

the climate change. It has also moved from being essentially single 

examples, sort of anecdotal evidence to statistically robust evidence. We are seeing changes in the timing of flowering, we are 

seeing changes in the time of migration, changes in the time of 

nest building, egg laying. We are seeing changes in the actual distributions of some species, where they occur. And we are beginning 

to see some mismatches occur between species that are related, like 

a butterfly and its food plant species for the caterpillar stage. 

The more important thing, I think, is to move from those signals 

of the moment to look forward with further climate change. And 

one can say the following things about it. Based on how biological 

communities responded to climate change in the geologic past, we 

can expect biological communities not to sort of move as a unit, but 

rather for the individual species to move in their own particular directions and at their own particular rates, which means that ecological communities will disassemble and the constituent species 

will assembly into novel communities. 

It is going to be a messy picture, watching that happen. The 

major difference between their response in the past and what we 

can expect in the future, of course, is that we have highly modified 

landscapes in many parts of the country and in the world, basically 

creating an obstacle course as species attempt to track their required environmental conditions. 

And some species will actually have nowhere to go. With a certain amount of sea level rise, the Key deer in the Florida Keys will 

have no habitat left. Species on tops of mountains as the climate 

warms will have no further up altitude direction to go. And we are 

also going to see a lot of ecosystem thresholds passed. We have already seen a couple in this country. The warmer nights have been 
9 

favoring certain insect pests like the wooly adelgid in Virginia and 

the pine bark beetle in British Columbia, Alaska and in the northwest. In the latter case, it is really quite dramatic, in some places 

up to 70 percent of the trees have died as a consequence. It looks 

like autumn foliage, except it is pine trees and it is a very serious 

forest management and fire management problem. 

So we are going to see these tipping points within ecosystems, 

many of which will be very hard to predict in advance. And we are 

also seeing system changes. The most prominent of those is the 

acidification of the oceans, which comes not from the climate 

change per se, but from the increased CO2 in the atmosphere. So 

today, literally, the oceans are 30 percent more acid than in preindustrial times, which has serious implications for any organism 

that builds a skeleton out of calcium carbonate. 

So one can conclude from all of that that the natural world is indeed highly sensitive to climate change. Although it is hard to 

make the detailed projections, I think it is pretty clear that a doubling of CO2 would be disastrous for the natural world. And even 

the figure of 450 parts per million, which some conservation groups 

have identified as a safe level to stop at, could be pretty messy in 

itself. 

So that is an overview of the topic, and thank you for the opportunity. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks very much, Dr. Lovejoy. It was a sobering beginning of our discussion. We look forward to questions. 

Dr. Roger Mann is our next witness. He is the Director of Research and Advisory Services at the Virginia Institute of Marine 

Services, School of Marine Science, which is the College of William 

and Mary’s professional graduate school in marine science. Dr. 

Mann is a marine ecologist who focuses on oysters, clams and 

invasive species in the Chesapeake Bay. He has been a researcher 

examining natural ecosystems and their management for both ecological services and sustained harvests of commercially valuable 

products for over 30 years. We are delighted to have you here and 

look forward to your testimony now, Dr. Mann. 

Senator WARNER. Would you indulge me, Mr. Chairman? 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Excuse me, I yield to my friend from Virginia. 

Senator WARNER. I want to welcome my constituent. The one 

thing that this witness has at his immediate disposal is one of the 

most precious and largest ecosystems in all of our United States, 

our Chesapeake Bay. The Congress has, year after fear, tried to 

support the rehabilitation of that system. And subject to his concurrence, I will give you my own opinion, having introduced with 

Senator Mathias, a long-time colleague here in the Senate, the initial legislation to try and reverse the trends in the Bay, we simply 

have not made any real, significant success. The Bay has continued 

to decline. 

So you have a built-in laboratory within a stone’s throw of where 

you are living your life in that magnificent community of Williamsburg, VA. So I thank this witness for taking the time to go up here 

through wind, sleet and snow this morning to joint us. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Senator Warner. 

Dr. Mann. 
10 

STATEMENT OF ROGER MANN, DIRECTOR FOR RESEARCH 

AND ADVISORY SERVICES, SCHOOL OF MARINE SCIENCE, 

VIRGINIA INSTITUTE OF MARINE SCIENCE, COLLEGE OF 

WILLIAM AND MARY 

Mr. MANN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Senator 

for those kind words. The Chesapeake Bay is indeed a national 

treasure and we should do whatever we can to ensure that it stays 

pure. 

I have been a researcher examining these natural systems, as 

was mentioned, for over 30 years. While my primary focus has been 

estuarine and coastal systems, it is really quite difficult to imagine 

how you can look at those without also examining and coming to 

understand the complexity of the watersheds that provide the rivers that flow into those systems. 

So indeed, in order to do my job, I have to know something about 

all the way to the feet of the Appalachians. Today I am going to 

talk to you with a regional focus on the Commonwealth of Virginia. 

As the Senator mentioned, the current worldwide projections for increase in temperature over the next century go between 3 and 7 

degrees Fahrenheit. All of these are based on models, and one of 

the things that is difficult about these large, global models is that 

when you try to look at small regional levels, they sometimes don’t 

work quite as well in terms of predictions. 

So when we look at the issue with Virginia, our predictions go 

anywhere from a 3 to 4 to 5 degree rise, or even one model that 

I’ve seen that goes as far as 11 degrees, very substantial changes. 

What is also bad about these models is they are not quite as good 

as predicting rainfall as they are looking at temperature, and really the two go together. So I have seen instances where we get drier 

conditions, wetter conditions, wetter conditions with more rain in 

the spring but less in the fall, or those combined with more tumultuous events like hurricanes. So there are lots of things on the palette here. Nearly all of them are bad. 

If you look at the whole issue and ask one question, is fresh 

water important, it is absolutely seminal. Fresh water affects everything that happens in wildlife. So when we look at these models, 

all of them are cause for concern. 

Virginia is indeed an excellent example as a laboratory to look 

at this, not just because of the Chesapeake Bay. But if you take 

a short walk across Virginia, you go from the Appalachians, 

through its foothills and the forests, through the rich areas of agricultural land into the freshwater marshes, into the salty estuaries 

that feed into the Chesapeake Bay with its salt marches, out into 

the continental areas where you see barrier islands and indeed, out 

onto the shallow continental shelf itself. 

This is a relatively small transact when one looks at it with respect to the size of this country. But when one looks at the animal 

and plant communities that exist along it, there is remarkable diversity. There is diversity in the east-west and the north-south direction. And the changes, as you look at these communities going 

one to the next, the biogeographic regions, the borders between 

them are all very subject to climate change. They will indeed move, 

as was described by Dr. Lovejoy. And in fact, we are watching 

those movements. 
11 

Again, perhaps to be a little repetitive, if there is one message 

that I can leave you today, just one, it is that destabilizing the 

habitat relationships between all of these animal and plant species 

that live in these single communities, then if you destabilize them, 

there is a potential domino effects. You take out one species or you 

alter it, then it affects the next species and then the next and then 

the next. 

So often the sort of signals that you do see and will see from climate change are not necessarily those that affect every species, but 

they start with this one small step. Probably the best analogy I can 

find is that of a spider’s web, where all parts contribute to stability 

and function. But if you break a limited number of the strands, the 

web is weakened. You only have to break a few more before the 

thing starts to disassemble very quickly. It is actually, I think, a 

fairly good analogy. And in talking to many of my colleagues who 

work with wildlife throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia, their 

concern is that we are starting to pick away at individual threads 

in this web. 

Again, if we take that quick walk across Virginia and we ask 

what are the predicted impacts, some of which we already have evidence for, but some of which we also expect, they go from the Appalachians to the coastal shelf. This is a quick list, and it is frightening: a higher prevalence of forest fires; increased impacts of insects on forest resources; fragmentation of the forest itself, which 

has considerable problems for the birds and wildlife; increased displacement of native plants by invasive species and forest freshwater wetlands and managed agriculture. 

That comment came from people who work in forestry and in agriculture many times. It is not just my particular bias towards 

invasive species. 

Changes in the nutritional value of farm crops. There is a lot of 

wildlife that eat farmed crops, as well as we do. Changes in river 

flow and water quality impact on freshwater fishes in both the rivers and in the lakes. Increased low dissolved oxygen seasonal dead 

zones in the Chesapeake Bay. This is truly frightening. Large parts 

of the deeper waters in the Chesapeake Bay have no oxygen in the 

summer. This is projected to get worse. It forces animals out of 

these deep water areas into the shallows where it is warmer. The 

end product is that they become more susceptible to diseases and 

we do see increasing diseases in both the fish populations. 

For those of you who have ever fished for striped bass, this is a 

magnificent fish. Striped bass is very susceptible here. Oysters the 

same. Two years ago, we saw a large dieback in the submerged 

aquatic vegetation in the shallows of the bay, temperature related. 

This is the crucial habitat for small crabs and fishes. 

As you go out onto the eastern shore, we see real threats to the 

food species for migratory birds that move up and down the Atlantic flyway. These are birds that just move through, but we are an 

important feeding stop. And when you move out onto the continental shelf, there are numerous species that are now moving 

northwards in their distributions and into deeper water. This is 

well documented. My graduate students have done it, amongst 

many others. 
12 

Across Virginia from the Appalachians to the intercontinental 

shelf, we are observing these changes. They can arguably be linked 

to global warming and we expect these trends to continue. As biologists, those of us who are watching it, we are concerned. All of us, 

all of us as custodians of this rich natural resource should be concerned and support action to try and halt these trends. 

Thank you for the opportunity to comment. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you very much, Dr. Mann. Excellent 

testimony. 

We now welcome David Stalling. Mr. Stalling is the Western 

Field Coordinator of Tout Unlimited. He lives and works in Missoula, MT. As part of Trout Unlimited’s public lands initiative, Mr. 

Stalling helps to inform and rally hunters and anglers to protect 

public wildlands for the American west. 

Mr. Stalling, my original text here in introducing you now says 

‘‘Mr. Stalling is a former Marine.’’ I know there is no such thing 

as a former Marine. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. So you are a Marine and an avid fisherman 

and bow hunter. Mr. Stalling has been hunting elk in Montana’s 

back country for more than 17 years. He has written hundreds of 

articles on elk, elk hunting, conservation, wildlife management and 

natural history. Perhaps you have an avid reader of some of your 

articles to my right here. 

He recently contributed a chapter to the Wildlife Management 

Institute volume ‘‘North American Elk: Ecology and Management.’’ 

It is a pleasure to have you here, and we look forward to your testimony now. 

STATEMENT OF DAVID H. STALLING, WESTERN FIELD 

COORDINATOR, TROUT UNLIMITED 

Mr. STALLING. Thank you, Senator. 

Senator WARNER. Would you indulge me a minute? 

Mr. STALLING. Yes. 

Senator WARNER. I hosted a breakfast for the Commandant of 

the Marine Corps right above this room this morning for about 150 

people. Were you present? 

Mr. STALLING. I was not, Senator. 

Senator WARNER. Then your absence should be noted. Thank 

you, Mr. Chairman. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. STALLING. Thank you for this opportunity, but more importantly, thank you for taking on this vital issue and trying to find 

immediate solutions. 

As mentioned, I am not a scientist, I am not a wildlife biologist. 

However, I am an avid hunter and angler and backpacker, and I 

spend a lot of time out in the wilds, particularly in Montana, and 

know the wilds there well, and spend a lot of time among the hunters and anglers of Montana and other places in the west. 

I cherish these wild places. I am very passionate about protecting 

them. That is what brought me to Montana when I left the Marine 

Corps in 1986, and it is what keeps me in Montana. It is also what 

keeps me fighting for their protection. And as mentioned, I do organize hunters and anglers throughout the west to help protect wet-
13 

lands. I am also the past president of the Montana Wildlife Federation, which is Montana’s oldest and largest conservation organization. And I volunteer for the National Wildlife Federation, in addition to working for Trout Unlimited. Prior to that I worked for the 

Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation in Missoula. 

The scientific evidence regarding global warming, and in my 

writing, I try to make the connection for people to understand the 

connection between good science and good wildlife management. So 

I do read a lot of the science, even though I am not a scientist. It 

seems the evidence regarding global warming is conclusive and 

overwhelming. Those of us closest to the land are seeing some of 

this first-hand, some of the things that scientists have been warning us about for years. 

Two summers ago I took a leave of absence from work, and I 

hiked from my front porch in Missoula, Montana all the way to 

Waterton, Alberta. It took me eight weeks. It was about 800 miles, 

through some pretty wild country. I only crossed three roads. I 

went through the Bob Marshall, the Scapegoat, the Great Bear 

Wilderness, the Mission Mountain Wilderness, Glacier National 

Park and on up into Canada. I saw grizzly bears, heard wolves, 

saw mountain lion tracks, saw a lot of elk and mule deer. This 

country has some of the wildest country left in the lower 48, some 

of the best hunting and fishing and back country opportunities left 

in the world, I think. 

And even back here, in some of this most remote wild, precious 

country, I saw some of the things first-hand that scientists have 

been warning us about. A lot of the streams and rivers back there 

are very low and drying out. Trout were congregated in pools 

where they were very lethargic and having trouble with the heat 

of the summer and more susceptible to predation. 

I walked through large swaths of forest that were affected by 

pine beetle and saw where there large, intense fires that were beyond what historically occurred and did a lot of damage. I also saw 

a lot of dead and dying white bark pines up in the alpine country, 

which I am told is a critical food source for grizzly bears. 

So I saw a lot of stuff, and of course, when I went through Glacier National Park at the end of my journey, I could see obvious 

declines in the size of the glaciers there. I have a picture of me and 

my father being up at some of those glaciers 20 years ago, and was 

able to compare some of those photos with photos I took during this 

trip. A lot of park rangers and scientists are now predicting those 

glaciers will be completely gone within 20 years. 

And I am not the only hunter and angler talking about this and 

seeing these changes. I talk to hunters and anglers throughout 

Montana who are saying the same thing. And as Senator Lieberman referred to earlier, the National Wildlife Commission just commissioned a survey looking at attitudes of hunters and anglers 

which I find pretty consistent with what I am seeing on the 

ground. Some of the highlights are 85 percent of us do believe we 

have a moral responsibility to do something about this issue; 80 

percent of us believe the United States should be a leader in this 

issue; and 75 percent of us think Congress should take immediate 

action to do something about it. 
14 

Hunters tend to be a pretty stubborn and conservative bunch. A 

lot of them are Republicans and Democrats and Independents. This 

is not and should not be a partisan issue. All the people I talk to, 

we may have our differences, but we all have a common concern 

there in Montana about what we are seeing on the land and how 

it is going to affect the thing we really cherish. 

So I join them in urging you to take some immediate steps in addressing this issue. I urge you to pass legislation that starts reducing greenhouse gas emissions and start helping us develop more responsible energy policies in this country that look at renewable 

sources of energy, alternative sources of energy, and more efficient 

ways of using energy that not only will help reduce greenhouse 

gases, but could help protect some of these wild places that we 

have also seen threatened by increased gas and oil development in 

the last 4 or 5 years. 

Also I think we need to take immediate steps to reconnect and 

restore and protect some of this critical wildlife habitat I am talking about. At Trout Unlimited we use our hand and fingers to illustrate some of this, particularly with rate and threatened species 

like bull trout. If this was a main stretch of a river going up to the 

little tributaries, which would be my fingers, up in the mountains, 

we have confined species like bull trout and west slope cutthroat 

to just some of these tributaries. They are already rare and threatened species. And with global warming, and we are seeing the reduction of water and increased flooding and things like that, they 

are going to be even more threatened. 

So we have to protect those tributaries, protect the habitat, reconnect that habitat with where they historically used to roam, 

then restore parts of that habitat so these wildlife are better able 

to adapt to the changes we are seeing on the ground. Therefore, I 

think any legislation, and I urge you that any legislation you do 

put forth includes funding for the State wildlife agencies to help us 

protect, conserve, restore and reconnect that habitat. 

Thank you for this opportunity. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Mr. Stalling. Excellent testimony. I 

must say, hearing about some of the things you do makes me wonder whether I made the right career choice. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. The next witness is Dr. Lee Foote, an Associate Professor in the Department of Renewable Resources at the 

University of Alberta. He also serves as Chair of the World Conservation Union’s North America Sustainable Use Specialist Group. 

Dr. Foote’s work focuses on wildlife habitat creation, especially waterfowl disturbance and reclamation. It is a pleasure to have you 

here, and we look forward to your testimony now. 

STATEMENT OF A. LEE FOOTE, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, 

UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA 

Mr. FOOTE. Thank you, Senator. I too thank you for the opportunity to speak to this group. 

I am speaking today as an individual and a professor at the University of Alberta. I am not a climatologist or a polar bear researcher. I spent 7 years working as a research ecologist for the 

U.S. Geological Survey, though. I am currently a dual citizen of 
15 

Canada and the U.S. So it is germane to talk about climate change 

and polar bears, given the endangered species legislation that 

seems to be looming. 

In my 5 minutes, I would like to talk about three main points. 

First, there are limits to our ability to understand and predict population responses of polar bears in response to climate change. It 

is important that we not ask more of science than science can deliver. Dr. Lovejoy has pointed out very clearly that there are great 

uncertainties in this. 

Second, I would like to talk about the results of the U.S. policies 

and Endangered Species Act and to point out that there are very 

real costs to people that live in proximity to these polar bears, especially in Canada’s north. These compound insults from climate 

change. 

Finally, hope to make some suggestions. Uncertainty. Predicting 

future population levels of any organism, especially mammals, with 

reasonable precision, is somewhere between difficult and impossible. I would like to quote from two peer-reviewed papers in the 

Journal Climate Research. They are written by a couple of Canada’s top ecologists, Dr. Charles Krebs, the author of the top ecology textbook in Canada, and Dr. Dominique Berteaux, who is a 

Canada research chair, similar to our NSF research chairs. The titles are Problems and Pitfalls in Relating Climate Variability to 

Population Dynamics and the second paper is Constraints to Projecting the Effects of Climate Change on Mammals. 

I would like to quote from this 2006 issue: ‘‘Our best short- term 

strategy is to measure and try to understand the observed small 

scale changes in population parameters without pretending to be 

able to predict long-term consequences.’’ The second quote: ‘‘Complex hypotheses with predictions tens of years ahead are fairy 

tales. There is no limit to an ecologist’s ability to explain events 

after the fact, and without rigorous scientific constraints, we will 

be little more than storytellers.’’ 

Reading the polar bear literature, it shows that it is both art, 

science, traditional knowledge and in the absence of data on many 

ranges of polar bears, it is a lot of necessity guesswork. Several 

well-studied populations are declining. Several lightly studied subpopulations are stable, and too many of our sub-populations, the 19 

mentioned by Senator Inhofe, are poorly known or completely 

unsurveyed. When one considers the variability in climate predictions, ice responses, ringed seal distributions, polar bear adaptability and movement and human interactions, the probabilities 

are cumulative. I liken this to trying to stack four bowling balls on 

top of each other, let them fall and make some prediction which direction the top bowling ball will actually go. It won’t be the same 

direction any two times. 

My second point today is a bit of a deviation. It relates to human 

welfare. Very roughly, there are approximately the same number 

of rural Inuit people living in Canada’s polar bear ranges as there 

are polar bears, about 16,000, once you remove the larger towns. 

This is spread out over an area roughly the size of the sub-continent of India. In our media, we hear a lot about bears, but little 

about the Inuit. The bear is indeed an icon. In a book I edited 2 

years ago called Conservation Hunting, we used a polar bear on the 
16 

cover. It is used in soft drink advertisements and candy bar wrappers. And the media loves this imagery. 

But the Inuit have a day to day reality and a history of living 

with bears, of bear hunting and in some cases being hunted by the 

bears over the last 3,000 years. Polar bears are a powerful symbol 

and a meaningful component of Inuit culture. Now, they have become a meaningful component of their economic lives. The Inuit 

manage their polar bears well and with deep understanding. They 

have made use of, sometimes modifying, the best scientific data 

presented as well. They kill approximately 400 polar bears each 

year and this hunt has great meaning to them. 

They also sell a much smaller number, between and 25 percent 

of these hunts, to sportsmen, like some of the individuals have 

mentioned here, the sporting tradition. I too am a sportsman. I will 

never hunt a polar bear, probably, and have really no desire to. But 

some do. This brings in crucial dollars to the Inuit culture, between 

$650,000 and $1.5 million per year. The hardest hunt on earth, 

conducted on dog sleds in sub-zero weather, 10 to 14 day hunts, 

which is truly a pivotal—it is like going back in time, is the way 

it is described. 

Under this regime, polar bears have been existing for, well, at 

the levels of 20,000 to 24,000, is what the data says, since 2001, 

which is about as far back as the truly trustworthy data goes. Ordinarily, I would recommend a prudent and precautionary principle. 

However, this impinges so heavily on individual cultures that I 

think we need to take a second look at the listing of ESP species. 

My third point is recommendation, and I have five quick ones. 

First, continue to build on the excellent nodes of polar bear research science that are ongoing right now. These include people 

like USGS’s Steven Amstrup, Canadian Wildlife Services’ Ian Stirling, University of Alberta Andy Derocher, Nunavut biologist Mitch 

Taylor. These folks are asking the right questions for us to understand and make informed decisions. 

Second, I would suggest we fund a wider study of sub- populations to bring them to the management forefront of science. 

Third, hold off on top-down policies like Endangered Species Act at 

this time. They are redundant, cumbersome, divisive, and appear 

indefensible scientifically when they are moving this forecast out 

45 years. They may backfire, as well. We need to avoid simple reductionist black and white statements, although the media and the 

court of law love this approach. We live in a an area of shades of 

gray on this issue. 

Fourth, empower bottom-up policy that involves traditional ecological knowledge, hunter trapper organizations, in addition to the 

excellent work by the polar bear technical committees. And finally, 

fifth, use and modify existing management structures to protect 

critical habitat. And there are many of these. 

All of these suggestions are compatible with simultaneously reducing emissions. Senator Boxer, you will be pleased to know that 

the Society of Wetland Scientists, on which I serve, will have a carbon neutral annual meeting in Sacramento this year. And I voted 

for that. I support that. 

We need to be aware that treating polar bear issues is treating 

the symptoms of climate change, though, and not the disease. Polar 
17 

bears are a response variable, not a driver in this case. As symbolic 

as they might be, we need to keep that in mind. 

Thank you very much. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Dr. Foote, for your testimony. I appreciate it. 

Our final witness on this panel is Dr. Brendan Kelly, who is an 

Associate Professor of Marine Biology and the Associate Vice President for Research at the University of Alaska. For 30 years, Dr. 

Kelly has studied Arctic wildlife, especially ice-associated marine 

mammals. 

Dr. Kelly, thanks for making the trip, and we look forward to 

your testimony now. 

STATEMENT OF BRENDAN P. KELLY, ASSOCIATE VICE 

PRESIDENT FOR RESEARCH, UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA 

Mr. KELLY. Thank you, Senator Lieberman and members of the 

committee. I appreciate the opportunity to testify this morning. 

My own university training includes a bachelor’s degree from the 

University of California, a master’s degree from the University of 

Alaska and a Ph.D from Purdue University, all in biology. But my 

real world teachers were Yupik and Inupiaq Eskimo hunters. For 

the past 30 years, I have studied Arctic wildlife, especially ice-associated marine mammals, whales, seals and walruses. 

The Arctic ecosystem is dominated by seasonal sea ice, which at 

least earlier in my career covered as much as 14 million square kilometers. That ice strongly influences the climate, oceanography 

and biology of the Arctic ocean and surrounding lands. One consequence of our warming climate is the melting of that sea ice. 

The ecological implications start with a specialized type of algae 

adapted to very low light levels and able to grow in and on that 

sea ice. Blooms of those algae on the under-surface of the ice are 

the basis for an elaborate food web leading through zooplankton 

and fish to seals, whales, polar bears and humans. 

The ice also strongly influences winds and water temperature, 

both of which are key determinants of upwelling, whereby nutrient 

rich waters are brought up to depths where there is sufficient sunlight for phytoplankton to make use of those nutrients. 

The Bering Sea produces our Nation’s largest commercial fish 

harvest, as well as supporting subsistence economies of Alaska Natives. Ultimately, the fish populations depend on plankton blooms, 

which in turn are controlled by the extent and location of the sea 

ice in the spring. 

Still higher in the food web are walruses and seals, for which the 

ice provides an important resting place. In fact, the greatest number of seal species occurs in the ice-covered polar seas. Seals and 

walruses have played and continue to play key roles in Eskimo 

subsistence economies. How those marine mammals will be impacted by climate change reflects their species-specific relationships 

to ice and snow. 

I would like to illustrate with two examples. Walruses feed on 

clams and other bottom-dwelling organisms. Over a nursing period 

of two or more years, the females alternate their time between attending their calf on the ice and diving to the bottom to feed themselves. The record ice retreat observed in recent summers has ex-
18 

tended the ice north of the shallow continental shelf. The result is 

the ice surface on which the calves are nurse is over water too deep 

for the female walruses to feed. The female thus must choose between feeding their calves or themselves. 

Ringed seals can dive and feed at greater depths. And their vulnerability to climate change involves their dependence on the snow 

cover on the surface of the ice. Ringed seals give birth in snow 

caves excavated above breathing holes they maintain in the sea ice. 

The snow caves protect the pups from extreme cold, and to a certain extent, from predators. As the climate warms, however, snow 

melt has been arriving increasingly early in the Arctic. And the 

seals’ snow caves collapse before the pups are weaned. Declines in 

ringed seals will impact other species, not least polar bears, for 

which they are the major prey. 

Whether the changes underway today will be survived by walruses, seals, polar bears, Eskimo culture, our economies and ways 

of life will depend critically on the pace of change. Ecosystems have 

changed before. Species have become extinct before. What is critically important about our changing climate is the rapid rate of 

change and its predicted acceleration. Adaption, biological and social, requires time for adjustment. 

The current rates of climate change, however, are very steep. 

Witness that the summer ice cover has decreased 26 percent during 

my career. 

If the biological and social environments change too rapidly, species and societies will not be able to keep pace. Thank you for your 

attention. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you, Dr. Kelly, for those examples 

that you have observed, and also for the warning at the end. 

Before we do get into questions, I do want to indicate that maybe 

I should notice you, Mr. Stalling, on this, that Larry Schweiger, 

President and CEO of National Wildlife Federation, asked that we 

submit testimony on his behalf, with thanks to you for testifying. 

Same for Jamie Rappaport Clark, who is Executive Vice President 

of the Defenders of Wildlife. 

[The referenced material can be found on page 46.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. We will do seven minutes of questioning 

each and see where that gets us. 

Dr. Lovejoy, let me begin with you. In your testimony, you mentioned that the shuffling of the ecological deck caused by unchecked 

global warming will favor opportunistic species, such as weeds and 

pests and diseases. I wonder if you could expand on that statement 

at this point, and also indicate what it might mean for agriculture 

in our country. 

Mr. LOVEJOY. Well, it is a pretty standard topic that, in disturbed ecosystems, invasive species seem to do particularly well. 

And much less so in relatively pristine, highly diverse biological 

communities. 

So we are actually seeing that already with the wooly adelgid in 

Virginia, we are seeing it with the pine bark beetle in our northwestern forests. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Say a little bit more about what you are 

seeing in Virginia. 
19 

Mr. LOVEJOY. Well, the wooly adelgid, which is an invasive species from Europe, I think, originally, particularly goes after hemlocks. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. What is it, actually? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. It is an insect. And it is sort of a white, fuzzy little 

thing. But it attacks coniferous trees. The mortality rate from the 

wooly adelgid has become a serious problem in Virginia. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. And the climate has done that, we think? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. It is because the night-time temperatures have 

been warmer, and as a consequence, the populations don’t get 

knocked back as much and kept in relative balance. In the case of 

the northwestern forests with the pine bark beetle, that actually is 

a native insect pest. But again, the balance has been tilted highly 

in favor of the pest. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. By the temperature? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. By successive mild winters and higher night-time 

temperatures. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

Mr. LOVEJOY. So basically we can expect some of those things to 

spill over into agriculture. We may not be able to predict which 

ones. But it is highly likely. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you. 

Dr. Mann, as someone who follows the temperature, seasonal 

timing and weather pattern changes that other scientists have 

been observing and predicting for Virginia, in the case of global 

warming continuing and expanding and increasing, can you say 

that those predictions include increased water temperature in the 

Chesapeake Bay, and assuming that is so, can you list again some 

of the impacts that you believe warmer water in the Chesapeake 

Bay would have on species that inhabit the Bay? 

Mr. MANN. I think there is a general consensus that we will see 

increasing temperatures in the Chesapeake Bay, and there are two 

effects, if you are looking at them, at the 10,000 feet level. Normal 

winters, cold winters typically knock back many of the diseases, so 

that when the warmer summers come, those diseases start to 

progress. If you have warmer winters, those diseases often get a 

foothold earlier in the year and the sorts of things that they attack, 

oysters and fish, are subject to a greater disease stress through the 

summer, simply because of this temperature cycling. 

Higher temperatures in the summer. The Chesapeake Bay is an 

interesting system, because it is an estuary. Saltwater comes in 

from the ocean, freshwater comes down from the watershed. The 

freshwater is less dense than the saltwater, because there is typically not much wind, the fresh water tends to sit over the top of 

the denser sea water. It doesn’t mix. 

What happens then is that the oxygen in the lower part of this 

gradually gets depleted by biological activity and you get an oxygen-free zone, effectively a dead zone in the deep water. Clearly, 

anything that is down there or should be down there no longer exists. In warming scenarios, this dead zone sets up earlier and it 

gets bigger. 

But the actual occurrence of that dead zone forces other things 

to happen. Animals that typically would go into that dead zone or 

into those deeper waters which are typically cooler, lose this lower 
20 

temperature refuge. I gave the example of striped bass, an absolutely magnificent fish. We know that about 80 percent of the 

striped bass in the Chesapeake Bay are infected with a bacterium 

called mycobacterium. This is typically at very low levels and it 

doesn’t manifest itself, it doesn’t alter the health of the animal. 

If, however, you force these animals into the shallow waters in 

the summer where it is warmer, one of the things that we have a 

strong evidence trail for at this point in time, is that that disease 

starts to proliferate. You only have to push the temperature up a 

little bit, and what you see is 30, 40, 50 percent of these magnificent fish occurring on anglers’ lines with large red lesions on them. 

They are really rather painful to look at. 

This is the result of a small temperature change. But it is this 

chain-like effect that starts with stratification and increased temperature. 

The Chesapeake Bay sits at the southern end of the distribution 

of a species called zostera, it is eel grass. Most of us don’t think 

very much about eel grass. But when you go out into the shallows 

in the Chesapeake Bay, it forms little forests, literally about this 

deep. Eel grass is an extraordinarily important habitat. It is where 

small fish and small crabs go to hide. They are hiding in there so 

that they can grow, so that they can move out when they get a little bit bigger and not get taken by the predators. 

In part because of the distribution of eel grass in this northsouth direction, in the summer of 2005 when we had an unusually 

warm summer in the Chesapeake Bay, the water went up to 30 degrees centigrade. I apologize, I think in centigrade, not Fahrenheit. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Compared to the norm? 

Mr. MANN. To the norm, which is about 28. A couple of extra degrees. What you saw was a large dieback in this habitat. The problem is that eel grass grows very slowly in terms of building a bed. 

One warm summer, the loss of a lot of habitat, the prospect of a 

long time for it go grow back, and if it doesn’t have more cool summers, it won’t grow back. What that means is that the crabs and 

the fish that typically use it as habitat have to look for other pieces 

of real estate, and they don’t find any that are as accommodating. 

You could say, well, won’t other grasses move in, aren’t there 

other grasses that do this? There are other grasses that potentially 

might move in, but they are different in their nature. They form 

small, ephemeral stands that last for a year or two and then move 

on. 

So rather like we have seen the suggestions that pine bark borers actually destroy parts of pine forests, large stable pieces of community over long periods of time, that it takes a long time to grow 

back after disturbance, the eel grass beds are much the same. Very 

small temperature changes, very significant losses, very long time 

periods for them to grow back. Very long time periods for critical 

habitats, fish and juvenile crabs. 

So when we go through this list, what we are seeing is not sort 

of a gradual change. You see what is a step function. You go past 

a certain temperature for a certain time and lots of things start 

changing, and they have domino effects. 

So in the Chesapeake Bay there are a number of these. And of 

course, not the last of which and not the least of which are the oys-
21 

ter diseases. As the good Senator noted, large amounts of money 

have been invested in trying to restore the ecosystems of the 

Chesapeake Bay. The oysters are actually central to that. The oysters at this point in time are challenged by not one but two very 

significant diseases. The activity of those diseases is strongly related to temperature. As the temperature goes up in the summer, 

the diseases get worse. 

And indeed, those diseases, one of which used to have a distribution from the Chesapeake Bay down into Texas, over the last 10 

to 15 years, we have seen the northern distribution of that disease 

go all the way to Long Island Sound. Long Island Sound has gone 

up by about 1 and a half degrees in the summer. Very small 

changes, very large effects, and definitely not linear, long time to 

recovery. The Chesapeake Bay is a laboratory in which we see lots 

of these. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. That is very compelling, because it is evidence you have observed. I appreciate your testimony. My time is 

up. 

Senator Warner. 

Senator WARNER. I would like to yield to the distinguished Ranking Member, and then I will follow in sequence. 

Senator INHOFE. I thank Senator Warner for that gesture. We 

are both working on the Armed Services, and there are events with 

our Chairman on the Floor right now, that are taking place. 

I was going to ask a question that I am not going to ask now, 

because I think it would probably take up too much of the time for 

my line of questioning. But during my opening remarks, I did refer 

to some of the individuals that have changed their position, some 

of the well-known scientists, climatologists, meteorologists, geophysicists and others who had very strong, they were certain about 

their position at one time, then they changed their position. I mentioned Claude Allegre from France. 

There is also David Bellamy from the U.K. who was absolutely 

certain of his position, and he has now reversed that as a result 

of the science that he has looked at over the past few years. Patrick 

Moore, who is one of the co-founders of Greenpeace, went through 

the same conversion. And just today, I found out about, a guy that 

I have been following, his name is Nir Shariv, he is the top astrophysicist in Israel, and he was one of them who was certain in his 

position also that it was in fact man-made contributions that are 

causing climate change. 

So with all of this that is taking place, my only position has 

been, let’s be real sure. If we are going to undergo the financial 

devastation in this country that, according to the Wharton Econometric Survey and others have said would happen, with some of 

the things with the greenhouse gases, or with the regulation of 

CO2, we want to be sure that the science is right. I go back and 

look at some of the scientists, such as Tom Wiggly, who happened 

to be Al Gore’s scientist, after an exhaustive study, that if all of 

the developed Nations signed onto Kyoto and followed its emissions 

requirements, it would only reduce the temperature over a 50-year 

period by 6/100 of 1 degree centigrade. 

So you folks are scientists and we are not. But we have to look 

at what the scientists are saying. And let me just deviate for a 
22 

minute, Mr. Stalling, I was listening to you. Back when I enjoyed 

life, and I was about your age, I used to do the same things that 

you are doing. So that was most enjoyable, and I am quite envious 

of your lifestyle now. 

This morning, there was an article that you probably have 

missed, because it just came out in Newsweek this morning, by 

George Will. He said over the millennium, the planet has warmed 

and cooled for reasons that are unclear, but clearly were unrelated 

to SUVs. Was life better when ice was a mile thick covering Chicago? Was it worse when Greenland was so warm the Vikings were 

farming there? Are you sure that the climate at this particular moment is exactly right and that it must be preserved no matter the 

cost? 

So rather than to ask you, if you were to have your choice of 

where a climate should be right now, would it be today’s, or would 

it have been back in the 1250s during the Medieval warming period, where some believe it was warmer than it is today? Or perhaps the 1650s during the little ice age or perhaps 1950 immediately following a period of warming and going into a cooling period? Maybe for the record you could send that back to me. 

But I do want to ask Dr. Foote some questions. The reason I 

want to ask this, we are talking about polar bears, and certainly 

you can’t look at the pictures that were shown by my good friend, 

Senator Boxer, without being sympathetic. However, when there is 

a discussion as to going into a 1-year process, determining whether 

or not to list the polar bear, I did start reading extensively. Now, 

in my opening statement, Dr. Foote, you heard me say, of the 19 

populations that 14 were relatively stable, and that perhaps the 

one population that is being used right now as the model is that 

of western Hudson Bay, where I concluded, after looking at it, we 

don’t have the exact time frame, but we have 5 years and 17 years, 

that approximately the reduction in population now is about the 

same as it would have been if hunting had not take place. 

Now, also the fact that in the 1950s, 50 years ago, the population 

has increased from 10,000 to approximately 25,000, more than doubled over that period of time. Do you agree with my analysis of the 

statistics that we had? 

Mr. FOOTE. There is some merit there. However, the Polar Bear 

Technical Committee, which is the brain trust of all polar bear research at present, is meeting at Edmonton, Alberta today. Just last 

week I called one of the participants and asked specifically about 

the early data. He said that those were, the 1960s and 1970s estimates are really not completely to be trusted. They were a rough 

index, 2001 is where our best data point comes. And it shows, it 

does show some moderate increase, even between that period. 

Senator INHOFE. Between 2001 and today? 

Mr. FOOTE. And today, 2006 was the last set of surveys. 

Your reference to western Hudson Bay, I have to compliment Ian 

Stirling on an exquisite piece of research and the program there. 

But it has to be kept in context. That is the southernmost population of polar bears and should be the first one to be affected and 

possibly affect—— 

Senator INHOFE. So range shift, this might be an example of 

range shift? 
23 

Mr. FOOTE. Well, it may be, and that is the question that was 

so eloquently put by the previous speakers about the oyster diseases moving northward. It is a bit simplistic, but I will use the 

analogy of a belt around the circumpolar Arctic, that the belt 

doesn’t necessarily get narrower, it may just shift upwards and 

back. There are many examples in the ecological literature and 

within conservation biology theory of this happening. But that is 

an uncertainty at this point. 

Therefore, my plea for greater research dollars to understand 

possible increases in bear population to the north, it could be compensatory with the losses to the south. It is one of the models. Is 

it absolute loss? Is it a range shift? And I would also welcome input 

or thoughts after this meeting from somebody that actually has 

studied ice, here sitting to my left, to know whether conditions actually can improve in the north for ringed seals to be able to become accessible to polar bears, whether multi-year ice conversion 

to annual sea ice in some situations, such as Davis Strait, could become a net positive. 

But these are the questions, and therefore my plea for greater research. 

Senator INHOFE. I see. And you have expressed concern that the 

proposed listing of the polar bear due to climate change is really 

about energy policy. Could you elaborate on that? 

Mr. FOOTE. I have underlined that, that was brought to my attention by the actual petitioners in a recent article. I have the 

quote here, December 2006, ESP listing decision is the reference. 

And one of their lead counsel said, it gives me hope that we can 

get the United States to reduce greenhouse gas pollution before it 

is too late to save the Arctic. That was in reference to the petition. 

So it started a logical thought process that maybe there was some 

other agenda at work here. 

Senator INHOFE. I see. Thank you very much, Dr. Foote, and the 

whole panel. This has been very enlightening to me. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks, Senator Inhofe. 

Senator Boxer. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you. Dr. Foote, thank you for your comments about going to Sacramento in an environmentally sound 

way. 

Mr. FOOTE. I am looking forward to that meeting. 

Senator BOXER. You signed a letter in 2002, along with dozens 

of Canadian scientists, that said, ‘‘We must reduce greenhouse gas 

emissions as rapidly as possible. Contrary to the views often portrayed by the press and industry spokespersons, there is little disagreement in the scientific community about climate warming.’’ Do 

you stand by that? 

Mr. FOOTE. I am full of questions, Senator Boxer. 

Senator BOXER. Do you take that back, then? I don’t have a lot 

of time, I just want to know if you have changed your mind since 

then. 

Mr. FOOTE. It has evolved substantially, and it will continue to 

evolve. 

Senator BOXER. So you don’t stand by the statement you made 

in 2002? 
24 

Mr. FOOTE. I would stand by a modified version of that. 

Senator BOXER. Okay, that is fair. Modified version, okay. 

Now, it is true that you work with the International Union for 

Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, often known as the 

World Conservation, Union, correct? And you were a regional chair 

for North American Within the Sustainable Use Specialist Group, 

is that correct? 

Mr. FOOTE. That is correct. 

Senator BOXER. Okay. Is it not true that your position is directly 

contrary to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature 

and Natural Resources? 

Mr. FOOTE. I speak as an individual. 

Senator BOXER. Yes, isn’t it true that they disagree with you? 

Mr. FOOTE. I do not know their position. 

Senator BOXER. Well, their position is that the polar bear is listed as vulnerable. The Polar Bear Specialist Group determined that 

due to decreasing sea ice because of global warming, the polar bear 

is in decline and listed as vulnerable. I just wanted to make the 

point that you stand alone from that group that you were a part 

of. 

I also want to put in the record parts of this review, if I can, Mr. 

Chairman. It is the analysis of our Fish and Wildlife Service, dated 

December 21, 2006. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. It will be entered into the record without objection. 

[The referenced material can be found on page 129.] 

Senator BOXER. Certain pages I want to put in here, it is an 

amazing picture of a polar bear here, and then on the inside, they 

say, observations, and these are peer reviewed, have shown a decline in late summer Arctic sea ice extent of 7.7 percent per decade, 

and in the perennial sea ice area of 9.8 percent per decade. And 

it goes on. The fact that our Administration would, before they 

even utter the words climate change or global warming, would 

come out with this, I think, Dr. Foote, it puts you at odds with a 

tremendous number of scientists here. 

I want to show you another photograph, if I can, and I am sorry 

Senator Inhofe has left, because I know he loves these photographs. 

This is a photograph of some baby polar bears and how they— 

where’s Jeff? It is the babies. The babies in the den. 

Where’s Jim Inhofe when I—Andrew? Could you call Senator 

Inhofe back. I wanted to show him this photograph. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator BOXER. What happens when this ice goes away? It is serious business. And Dr. Foote, I know you care about the hunting 

of the Indian tribes, and I have great sympathy for their way of 

life, believe me. But at some point, science is science and we have 

to all deal with the science. 

So I am going to move on. I want to talk to Dr. Lovejoy. First 

of all, Mr. Chairman, I am going to leave after these questions, 

which I am sure Dr. Foote will be happy to know. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator BOXER. This is the best panel. I mean, as we were saying 

quietly, they’re just, they’re understated, they’re speaking from 

their heart, from their mind and from their experience. Dr. 
25 

Lovejoy, could you explain to me the issue of the oceans acting as 

a sink for carbon, and how much do the oceans absorb of the carbon? I know some it is man-made, some of it is natural. But do you 

have a picture of that, and what is the impact of this continuing 

action of the oceans to act as a sink? And at what point will it stop 

acting as a sink? Will there be a point where they can’t take in any 

more? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. I can’t give you all the precise numbers, but I can 

get them for you. The reason we don’t have a lot more climate 

change is because the oceans have been taking up a huge amount. 

Senator BOXER. Is it about 30 percent? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. It is at least 30 percent. They have been taking up 

a huge amount of heat and a huge amount of CO2. And a certain 

amount of that has translated, as I mentioned, into a rise in acidity. We remember acid lakes and acid rain, and we dealt with that 

pretty well with a great—— 

Senator BOXER. In the air. 

Mr. LOVEJOY.—market mechanism, and sulfur in the coal. But in 

this case, you are talking about two-thirds of the earth’s surface 

changing its basic chemistry. It is simple high school chemistry. 

Senator BOXER. Well, I wanted Senator Warner, because he is a 

fisherman, to hear this again. So right now, the oceans are absorbing at least a third of the carbon dioxide, and it is causing more 

acid. That is having an impact on the sea life. And how is that 

showing up, if it is showing up right now? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. This has been a bit of a surprise to the scientific 

community. You didn’t even hear about it 2 or 3 years ago. They 

actually so far have not picked up any immediate effects. But what 

we do know is that the calcium carbonate equilibrium, which just 

tens of thousands of different kinds of species used to build their 

shells, whether they are corals or clams or oysters or tiny little 

things which exist in the trillions as basis of food chains, at a certain point many of them will have difficulty just constructing their 

shells. If it continues further, they reach a point in which in fact 

their shells will go into solution while the animals are still alive. 

Senator BOXER. Oh, boy, so anything with a shell. 

What about, and anybody who wants to comment on this last 

question, what about the warming of the oceans? So we have an 

impact of the acidity and then, is there a separate impact with the 

warming? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. Let me just lead off. The first parts of the ocean 

which have shown themselves to be particularly sensitive to the 

warming are coral reefs. Corals are basically a partnership between an algae and an animal. Just the smallest increase in water 

temperature will cause the coral to expel the alga, so you get what 

are called bleaching events. And all of a sudden, these extraordinary technicolor environments turn into a black and white movie. 

Those are happening more and more frequently, and the issue is, 

how soon will we see coral reefs that have so much, such frequent 

bleaching that they can’t recover? 

Senator BOXER. Thank you. Anybody else want to add to that. I 

still have a few seconds left. 

Mr. MANN. I think that is the prime example that we all see. I 

think the issue about the redistribution of species becomes a second 
26 

part of this. Again, it is this issue of when you redistribute species, 

they also get out of synchrony with one another. What can typically 

happen is that you have food blooms, food species that are necessarily connected to seasonal daylight, typically over evolutionary 

time, the things that eat those food species have become in synchrony, but often the thing that synchronizes them is temperature. 

So if you are looking at something changing something else, the 

first one may be sunlight, the second one might be temperature. 

If you change the synchronizing function in the second part, it 

misses the food bloom. And there are in fact documented cases of 

this, it has been a debate in the fisheries literature for over 100 

years, called a simple mis-match theory. What you are liable to see 

is larger numbers of mis-matches. When you see larger numbers of 

mis-matches, you see failures to recruit, you see failures of year 

class in fisheries. That has not only great ecological effects, it potentially also has very significant economic effects. It doesn’t take 

much of a temperature change to do this. 

Senator BOXER. A mis-match? 

Mr. MANN. A mis-match. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks very much, Senator Boxer, for 

spending the time with us and for your continuing commitment to 

see this committee through to some accomplishment on this subject 

matter. 

Senator Warner, it is all yours. 

Senator WARNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to take 

my round and then following your questions, maybe a few more. 

Just again on a personal note here, I am not much of a traveling 

Senator, at least other than to Iraq and Afghanistan, where I have 

been going constantly for 3 years, as most of us have, too. But I 

was thinking, Mr. Chairman, and I say to both distinguished chairmen, I look back on the mistakes I have made in my 29 years in 

the Senate. And one was the failure to join John Chafee when he 

was chairman of this committee on some marvelous trips he put together. I remember I wanted to go down and study the rain forest 

in Brazil and others, where he actually went out and put a handson attitude. 

And I am thinking this subject is so important, and I will put 

this question to each of you to answer in your own way, is there 

a possible benefit if members of this committee, maybe you could 

assign some members to do one and some members to do another, 

if you were to organize a field trip somewhere geographically in 

your own area where we could go out and see with our own eyes, 

possibly, some of the facts that you bring to bear. 

And probably more importantly, I talked to some of the old- timers. I am particular partial to old-timers now. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator WARNER. But I remember going with my father into the 

upper reaches of the Blue Ridge Mountains as a small boy, trout 

fishing. And the trout were in abundance. Today, the acid rain has 

virtually removed them from many of the streams in my beloved 

Blue Ridge Mountains. Because those mountains are in the direct 

path of the effluent that comes out of the industrial valleys of 

American and the coal burning facilities, that is another whole 
27 

story. I am not here to talk against coal, or I would be voted out 

of office tomorrow, given my State’s position in coal. But I have 

fought for many years on trying to clean up these plants. 

Regrettably, if I may digress a minute, literally millions and millions of dollars, Bob Byrd and I and the other coal States have 

taken out of the Senate to study clean coal technology, they are 

building a brand new coal plant, I mean a big coal-fired plant in 

Virginia, and they are not spending a dollar on trying to clean up 

the effluent. Now, maybe some modification, I understand there is 

something in that plant, isn’t there? Well, I can’t even get the staff 

to talk about it. Maybe I had better correct the record. But none 

of this clean coal technology is coming into effect on the coal plants. 

But anyway, back to my question. If for instance my good friend, 

my new friend and going to be a good one, Mr. Stalling here from 

Montana, I would be glad to head the mission to Montana. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. I was just going to say that I was going to 

head the mission to go trout fishing with Mr. Stalling. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator WARNER. I have been to the Antarctic and I have seen 

the polar bears. You go up there. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Dr. Kelly, I will see you. 

Senator WARNER. And talk to some of the old-timers who with 

their own eyes, talk about all this scientific data, have seen, as my 

father if he were living would vouch and I can vouch, we have seen 

it in our own States through the years, those of us who still walk 

through the hills. So that we can bring back to the Senate some 

of our own ideas. 

Now, I will start out here in order. Do you think a field trip, you 

could organize it on your particular subjects, to some geographic 

area in this country that would be of value? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. Absolutely. Seeing is believing. 

Senator WARNER. What would we see? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. I think it would be important to start off with 

something really dramatic, like the dying forests of the northwest 

from that pine bark beetle. 

Senator WARNER. I have seen that recently. 

Mr. LOVEJOY. There are some stretches in northern Arizona 

where the trees are just gone because of climate change drought. 

Senator WARNER. All right, so you could put together for maybe 

a two-day trip or something, something that would be beneficial, 

and you would round up a couple of old guys like myself who could 

actually relate to it, is that right? 

Mr. LOVEJOY. Absolutely. 

Senator WARNER. Good. Mr. Mann. 

Mr. MANN. I would be delighted to host such a trip. I can take 

you everywhere from the remains of the current SAV, the submerged aquatic vegetations, if there are any striped bass around, 

we will give you a rod and reel, and failing that we will cheat and 

use a troll net. If I can get my friends in the Virginia Department 

of Agriculture and Consumer Services, very good friends who have 

worked with me on this, we can certainly find you some places 

where there are some invasive species and we can maybe, if there 
28 

is enough time, even get you into the forestry areas. I would be 

happy, happy to host such a trip. 

Senator WARNER. Mr. Stalling. 

Mr. STALLING. Oh, yes, I would be thrilled to take people up to 

the Rocky Mountain front where the Great Plains meet the Rockies 

on the east side of Glacier National Park, which is a place where 

legislation was recently passed, in an effort led by hunters, to protect from irresponsible gas an oil development. But there are impacts there as far as the loss of white bark pine and the declining 

glaciers and impacts to some of the last strongholds for pure 

strains of west slope cutthroat trout, like Badger Creek and Two 

Medicine Creek that seem to be drying up every year. 

Senator WARNER. All right, seriously, I sent Mr. Stalling a note 

that in 1943, in preparation for trying to build myself up to go into 

World War II, which I did the last year, my father bought me a 

train ticket to Missoula, Montana, your town, and I got a job with 

the Forest Service as a firefighter. It is interesting, I went back 

with the Forest Service here 2 years ago, out at Coeur d’Alene, to 

find our camps, which were hard to find. I saw the devastation to 

the white pine from that beetle. It is tragic, these magnificent trees 

just dying as far as the eye can see. That is one of the most valuable pieces of lumber that we have. 

Mr. STALLING. Another value to going up there would be you 

would be able to meet a lot of hunters and anglers and tribal leaders and ranchers and all kinds of folks who are very concerned 

about this issue. 

Senator WARNER. All right. I am talking about people who have 

seen it with their own eyes. 

Mr. FOOTE. Senator Warner, you may have some border issues 

getting into Canada with the recent flux of movement back and 

forth. So I am going to nominate Dr. Kelly to be our tour guide for 

the Arctic, where you can talk to the ultimate old- timers, the 

Inupiat and the Nuvialuit individuals whose direct linage goes 

back 3,000 years in close concert with climate change and polar 

bears. 

Mr. KELLY. Senator Warner, I would be happy to introduce you 

to some elders, that is how the natives refer to the old- timers, as 

you put it—— 

Senator WARNER. You ought to hear what they call me around 

here. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. KELLY. Well, these are gentlemen—— 

Senator LIEBERMAN. We call him Senator, or Mr. Chairman. 

Senator WARNER. The old bull they turned back into the back 40 

acres here recently. Go ahead. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. KELLY. I would be happy to introduce you to a gentleman 

who received shotguns from their fathers as well and have fond 

memories of learning to hunt from their fathers. And I think you 

would be impressed to hear their descriptions of the changes in 

their environment in their lifetime. And to see the sadness in their 

eyes when they talk about the likelihood that their children will 

not experience it the way they did, because the changes are so profound. I think I detected a bit of disinterest in going to the Poles 
29 

again on your part, but I think you would find these people very 

eloquent in their explanations of what is really happening. 

Senator WARNER. I thoroughly enjoyed both of my trips, both to 

the North and South Pole. But that is when I was Secretary of the 

Navy, had my own plane and my own submarine to punch up 

through the ice. It was a little easier. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. KELLY. I can’t compete with that. 

Senator WARNER. Well, there we are. I think we have a challenge. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Yes. 

Senator WARNER. And I want to get into some other questions, 

but you go ahead and then—— 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Oh, you go right ahead. 

Senator WARNER. Well, I wanted to come back. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Let me just say what a pleasure it is going 

to be to work with you on this Subcommittee. I am already enjoying it. So thank you for your interest. 

Senator WARNER. This is an exciting panel. Some of these scientists are going to come in here and we are going to have to get 

anti-doze pills. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator WARNER. We really need, there is nothing like getting 

out of Washington. We all think this is the pinnacle of all knowledge. Well, it isn’t. We have to get out and do a little hands-on. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Yes, sir, I totally agree. I want to respond 

briefly before you do your questions, and we will start the clock 

back at seven minutes. 

It is a great idea. Senator Boxer, before she left, said she is planning a trip to Greenland. I think it would be a great thing just to 

start in Virginia for a day, right next door, easy enough to get 

there and then we will systematically visit the other spots. Thank 

you for that suggestion. 

Senator WARNER. Thank you. Well, let’s see what we can do, because I just think that we need anecdotal, I mean, all of this scientific data, and I don’t disparage scientists, but to get our attention of our colleagues, just get them to go back and talk to their 

own constituents. Just ask all the other 98 Senators to pack up and 

make their own inquiries. 

I am fascinated with Dr. Mann’s story about the dead zones in 

Chesapeake Bay. As I have traveled here in the last couple of 

years, I have been hearing about hat. Is there any evidence, now 

let me give you a point, I was privileged to get through a piece of 

legislation here recently to provide a little modest Federal funding 

to support going back and taking Captain John Smith’s diaries and 

go up to all the inlets in 1608. He kept prolific diaries. 

Do you have any record of the dead zones being detected years 

back, or is it a phenomena that has come on here in the past 10 

or 15 years or whatever period of time? 

Mr. MANN. I think the problem with most of the things in science 

is that you actually don’t know if things are there until you actually go and look. I also have looked at some of John Smith’s diaries, 

and they are wonderful natural history records. 
30 

The problem with the dead zone though is that you really have 

to go out into the Chesapeake Bay and take instrumentation that 

you can put to the bottom to measure the oxygen. Unfortunately, 

John Smith didn’t have such instrumentation available. 

Senator WARNER. But he could have seen the striped bass with 

these lesions on them, which you and I have seen. 

Mr. MANN. He could have seen if they had been there. In fact, 

they have really become more prevalent over the last decade or so. 

Prior to that, mycobacteriosis, or myco, as it is common called, was 

not something that was very prevalent and it didn’t cause much 

concern. When it did arrive on the proverbial scene, it was really 

quite widespread and it was a very sudden event. I think lots of 

individuals were worried about what this might be. A certain 

microorganism called physteria was originally invoked. It turns out 

not to be the case. 

But I think the striped bass observations over the past decade 

are very typical of the sorts of things that we expect to see, not just 

in aquatic systems, but everywhere else, as my colleagues here 

have pointed out, significant changes can occur and nothing appears to happen. Then you pass thresholds which affect the biology 

of the animal very significantly, and then terrible things happen. 

The coral reefs are a good example. Most organisms that live on 

coral reefs live very near that temperature maximum. But generally, the temperature doesn’t go past it, so you don’t see them actually changing. You push the temperature up a little bit and lots 

of things go wrong very quickly. 

So I think when you look at these particular canaries, if you like, 

you will start to see very large numbers of them. Several of my colleagues here have mentioned pine bore beetles. In preparation for 

this testimony, I spoke to a friend of mine who works in the Forestry Department in Virginia, and he said his biggest concern at 

the moment, his biggest concern, is that beetles that typically have 

a 2-year life cycle, it takes them 2 years to go through their life 

cycle, and while they are alive, they munch on trees, if it warms 

up just a little bit, they will go to a 1-year life cycle. If they go to 

a 1-year life cycle, instantly the numbers of them double. 

And this is one of these very step functions, if you can imagine 

suddenly just doubling all the populations of destructive beetles. So 

when you look at this, there are people who are waiting for these 

to happen. And he bases his observations on what has happened 

in the west. He is gravely concerned that this might happen in the 

pine forests in Virginia as well. 

Senator WARNER. Well, we have to be very careful when we 

blame all the ills of our natural environment, not to attribute it all 

to global warming. As an old trial lawyer, you have to have a chain 

of proof, almost beyond a reasonable doubt, I think, before we are 

going to see any real action here. Because the economic interests 

of a drastic change in our energy supplies and so forth, which affect 

this, are going to whipsaw, believe me. Talk about this institution 

where you and I have been now a couple of decades. If you want 

to get one issue that you can’t deal with unless you have an answer, it is the loss of jobs. And that could be impacted by various 

steps we have to take. 
31 

But that is not to say I am deterred. But I just want to make 

sure that this chain of evidence, as an old trial lawyer, it has to 

be almost beyond a reasonable doubt if you are going to tie it and 

warp it around global warming. 

Back to the striped bass, I recall a couple of years ago, you may 

have the accurate dates, we actually put an embargo, stopped all 

the fishing and everything. And I have forgotten how many years 

we shut it down, but then they just came back in increased numbers, almost. Can you correlate that? And that is within the last 

decade. We have the accurate facts when we shut it down and 

when we opened it up again. 

Mr. MANN. Actually, it is a little bit older than that, sir. It is 

about the last 15 years. 

Senator WARNER. Fifteen. 

Mr. MANN. But the closure was really a response to a fishing effort. 

Senator WARNER. Probably was. 

Mr. MANN. And of course, there are few things that you can control in natural populations except the exploitation rate. And it certainly was very unpopular when the suggestion was that you close 

it and let the stock rebuild. But nonetheless, the closures took 

place, and now we have a fairly healthy population in terms of its 

size. It certainly is one of the good examples of working with fishermen to actually rebuild the stock and then to try to manage it, so 

that everybody has an opportunity to use it, whether it is commercially or recreationally. 

Senator WARNER. Right. But that gives you an example of how 

a species can regenerate itself if you take a certain pressure off. 

Now, if they were going through some extraordinary 1 or 2 years 

of climate change, that pressure may diminish that species. But if 

Mother Nature comes swinging back again to more normal temperature changes, I would think there hopefully could be a regeneration of the species again. But if we react too quickly to these abnormal cycles that we are experiencing now, and we have a very 

significant detriment to our economy, the fish may come back but 

the jobs may not. 

Mr. MANN. I agree. 

Senator WARNER. Take me on as hard as you want. Let’s not be 

pleasant about this thing. Let’s just get our brass knuckles out and 

go at it. 

Mr. MANN. Caution is the word of the day. I think all of my colleagues here have also said that. 

Senator WARNER. All right, thank you. I will come back maybe 

with another question. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thanks very much. 

Dr. Kelly, I know that your work doesn’t focus on the polar bear, 

the much-mentioned polar bear, much-loved. But obviously the 

polar bear exists in the environment in which you are working. So 

I want to ask you to comment, testify to any alterations that you 

have seen in the polar bear environment and in the species itself, 

if any. And also I suppose just comment maybe on your reaction 

to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service beginning a process which it 

concludes will list the polar bear as a threatened species and list 

climate change as one of the reasons for that. 
32 

Mr. KELLY. I would be happy to. I have spent some time working 

on polar bears with Steve Amstrup with the U.S. Geological Survey. And as I mentioned, the species that I spent a lot of my career 

studying, ringed seals, are the prime food of, in fact, 90 percent of 

what polar bears eat in Alaska are ringed seals. So we encounter 

them frequently in our field work. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. And you are, just to repeat in your testimony, you said you are already seeing the environment of the 

ringed seals compromising their numbers. 

Mr. KELLY. What we are seeing is these premature snow melts 

that are exposing the young seal pups prematurely to both predation and extreme weather events. This can only have a negative 

impact on the seals and hence the bears. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Right. 

Mr. KELLY. I think, all I can say in terms of the proposed listing 

of polar bears is that you know, there are lots of things that as scientists we get really picky about, levels of confidence about statements we make and about the data and we are trained to be very, 

very conservative in our analysis of data. 

But as policy makers, I think you are in a different position. You 

need to look out for the welfare of the whole Nation and the wildlife. I think it is important to listen to the different points of view 

and recognize that you have to decide when you have enough information to act and when waiting is not a prudent thing to do. 

I think it is not, there are lots of things that are hard to predict 

in terms of ecological responses to changes in environment. But 

changes to ringed seals, polar bears, walruses, these ice-associated 

marine mammals, are pretty straightforward to predict. It is clearly going to have an extremely negative impact on them and it could 

in fact lead. 

So I guess I would have to say I think it is with good foresight 

that the Fish and Wildlife Service predicts that this kind of a 

change in habitat will in fact threaten polar bears. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Let me take you one more step in this. You 

indicated in your testimony that in your career you had seen the 

summer ice diminish by 26 percent. So when we see the pictures 

that Senator Boxer showed of the polar bears, seeming to be 

stranded on a piece of ice or jumping from one to the other, the layman’s conclusion is, well, the ice is melting so the area in which 

the polar bear can exist is smaller, therefore the species is threatened. 

Is that, for the record, that is the layman’s reaction. I want you 

to speak to how the disappearance of 26 percent of the summer ice 

affects the polar bear. Maybe that is not direct, but you know what 

I am asking. 

Mr. KELLY. Yes, I do, I think. I am a little bit reluctant to participate too much in this idea of using polar bears as sort of the 

poster species, simply because then all of a sudden, the argument 

starts to about a single species. And what is important, in my view, 

is the entire ecosystem. Hence I talked about algae that live in the 

ice. I talked about fish and plankton that are all associated with 

that. 

So you have to understand that, I sort of think this is not like, 

well, we have just wiped out all the bison, but now we are rolling 
33 

up the plains behind them, to having the sea ice go away. It is taking the whole ecosystem out. It is not just taking the charismatic 

mega fauna away. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Very good point, and I take it. 

Mr. KELLY. And that said, the fact is that yes, I was there when 

that photo was taken of the bear pouncing. That was taken up near 

Angle Island. Yes, you can show polar bears doing that in situations where the local conditions are quite healthy and fine. 

But just last week in Anchorage, at a science symposium, I heard 

presentations by the polar bear research community on their latest 

research. One of the things that was particularly compelling to me 

was that they had very good information on denning sites from satellite tracking that has gone on for several decades. And what they 

see is a substantial shift from, most bears in Alaska used to den 

on the sea ice, and few on land. And now increasingly larger numbers are denning on land, because the ice is so far offshore. 

This is a big response, a big change. And it is for reasons like 

that, I think there are data out there that we would be foolish not 

to extrapolate and be proactive rather than waiting until we can 

show with 95 percent confidence that the population has declined 

by X amount. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you. I appreciate that answer very 

much. It is very helpful. 

Mr. Stalling, let me ask you a last question. In your testimony 

you talked about changes you have observed in the trout. Neither 

you nor I are scientists. But I presume, correct me, that you have 

read some of the science here and if I am right, to the extent that 

you have, what does the science tell you to explain the changes 

that you have observed in trout? And obviously, particularly to the 

extent that it is convincing, the effect of global warming. 

Mr. STALLING. With less snow pack and less waters in the 

streams and hotter conditions and the water evaporating and drying out quicker, we are just seeing less stream flows and lower 

streams. I have seen a lot of trout in the streams that I fish bunch 

up more in what deep pools still remain. And as the water gets 

warmer and the fish are bunched up more, there is a lack of oxygen and increased algae which further takes the oxygen and puts 

a lot of stress on the fish. It makes them more susceptible to predation. 

In fact, the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks is increasingly 

closing our rivers, many of our rivers, like the Big Hole, and the 

Badger and the Dearborn, fishing earlier and earlier in the summer, because they are drying up so quickly. And the fish are so 

stressed that it is just not looking so good for them. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Thank you very much. 

Senator Warner. 

Senator WARNER. Let me follow onto that important question. I 

recited what I have seen in acid rain. But do you see changes in 

trout populations in either the east or the west or east coast? We 

are east coast here, obviously, the Blue Ridge Mountains. But what 

about the west coast? 

Mr. STALLING. That I am not familiar with, Senator, but I could 

find out and get back to you. 
34 

Senator WARNER. I think we need to look at the entire geographic spectrum on that. Of course, we know that the trout is a 

magnificent fighting fish, that is why we spend so much of our lives 

trying to outwit it. And it is a smart fish. 

But are they more susceptible than other species? I mean, the old 

catfish in our ponds in Virginia and the crappie and other things, 

they seem to proliferate, nothing can stop them. Is it because of the 

weakness of their system? 

Mr. STALLING. Senator, they are real sensitive to warmer temperatures, they are generally in cold fisheries. They need that cold, 

clear water that we get in the mountains of Montana. 

Senator WARNER. My last question, Mr. Chairman, is to follow on 

your question with Dr. Kelly. 

Is there any correlation between the problems that the commercial fishermen in the Antarctic are experiencing to global warming? 

Mr. KELLY. Did you say in the Antarctic? 

Senator WARNER. Well, up there in the Arctic, in that whole region, the Antarctic or Arctic. 

Mr. KELLY. Yes, the rich Bering Sea fishery, as I stated in my 

testimony, is very much linked into the ecology of the ocean as, it 

is really dominated by sea ice. And starting with the plant production—— 

Senator WARNER. Dominated by sea ice? 

Mr. KELLY. Sea ice, that is correct. Oceanography and where the 

nutrients go, where the primary production happens, the plant life 

that supports the fish population is very much driven by where sea 

ice is in the springtime. So what we are beginning to see are, we 

think, a shift from a community where the bottom communities are 

where a lot of the nutrients end up, to a very different situation 

where, because of the changing oceanography associated with ice 

retreat, the nutrients are more concentrated in the water column. 

That means a very different suite of organisms living there. It may 

mean a less productive system. 

But most importantly, I think, for commercial fisheries is that it 

is a very abrupt shift in what is there and what is available to be 

captured. So this is one of many ways in which we are likely to see 

very substantial economic impacts. This is huge in terms of over 

half of our national fisheries. 

Senator WARNER. Mr. Chairman, we should congratulate this 

panel, who have come from distances afar to join us here today. I 

think their associates and colleagues and following constituencies, 

as we say, across America, should be grateful to them. 

Senator LIEBERMAN. Hear, hear. I agree. I thank you all, not only 

for your testimony that you have offered here and the answers that 

you have given to our questions, but each of you has submitted testimony that I know you worked on for the record of the Subcommittee. It is really worth reading. It is very, very important and 

to me very impressive. 

I will say that in the time that I have been interested in this 

problem, I will either give credit or blame to Tom Lovejoy for having done some of the first work. We go back to Yale together. But 

he is self-evidently younger than I. 

Senator WARNER. Does that old school tie hunt out in Montana, 

Tom? That dog don’t hunt out there, does it. 
35 

[Laughter.] 

Senator LIEBERMAN. In the time that he has been working on 

this, and helped others of us wonder about it, we have gone from 

basically projecting scientific models to some of the consequences to 

seeing some of the consequences. And you have testified today very 

quietly, very methodically, to what you have observed, although I 

do think that some weight of your testimony cries out quite loudly 

for us to try to find a way to respond to this challenge. 

So I thank you very much. The record of the hearing will be kept 

open for 10 days, if you want to submit any additional comments, 

if we want to burden you with any additional questions for you to 

answer. But I thank you very, very much for the work you have 

done here. Senator Warner, I thank you for your interest in this. 

I truly look forward to working through this with you to some good 

result. 

The hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:00 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

[Additional statements submitted for the record follow:] 

STATEMENT OF THOMAS E. LOVEJOY, PRESIDENT, HEINZ CENTER FOR SCIENCE, 

ECONOMICS AND THE ENVIRONMENT

Thank you for the opportunity to testify on climate change and its effects on wildlife, namely the rest of life on earth or biodiversity. I am Thomas Lovejoy, President 

of the Heinz Center for Science, Economics and the Environment, a non-partisan noadvocacy environmental policy center that engages business, Government, academia 

and environmental groups in developing environmental policy. 

I have been engaged in the topic of this hearing for more than two decades, having produced the first book on the subject with Rob Peters in 1992 and just 2 years 

ago a completely new one with Lee Hannah, a copy of which I present here. The 

distinct difference between the two, and indeed what led to doing a new one, is that 

today there are well documented and statistically significant examples of nature responding to climate change. Some of these changes involve different timing in the 

annual cycles such as migration or flowering, others involve changes in where species occur, yet others involve threshold changes in ecosystems, and some involve systemic changes such as the acidification of the oceans. The data have moved from 

the anecdotal to the statistically significant and they demonstrate unequivocally 

that nature is on the move. There is by now a global scientific literature on this 

subject but I will restrict myself here to American science and examples. 

Climate change is not new in the history of the earth, but it is new in the history 

of human civilization and our dependence on the natural world. For the last ten 

thousand years, the entire human enterprise has been built on the assumption of 

a stable climate, including the origin of agriculture which in turn made human settlements possible, and our entire recorded history. For that period the patterns of 

nature and of individual species and organisms have been attuned to the unusual 

period of stability. Today we can see the first stirrings. The map of geographical 

growing zones that constitute a bible for gardeners as to what they can or cannot 

grow, has recently been revised to accurately reflect the climate change that has already taken place. Tree swallows were laying eggs nine days earlier by 1991 in comparison to 1959 (2), In the western United States there is earlier flowering by 2 

days per decade for lilacs and 3.8 days per decade for honeysuckle (3). In the midAtlantic experimental evidence shows that poison ivy is favored by higher concentrations of the greenhouse gas CO2. One of the best studied butterfly species in the 

United States, the Edith’s Checkerspot has changed its geographical range generally 

moving northward and upslope (4). 

One of the immediate consequences and a foreshadowing of things to come are 

mismatches between species and their environment and linked species. For example 

if one species depends on temperature for cues and the other day length, climate 

change will change one and not the other. This has been occurring between the 

checker spot and the flower species on which it depends (5). In the arctic some 

seabird species which feed on the Arctic cod, a species which lives on the underside 

of the ice, are no longer able to breed successfully because the ice edge is too far 

from the land on which they must nest (6). 
36 

The important issue before us is not the stirrings we can already document but 

the changes that further climate change is likely to engender. Here we can turn for 

glimpses of the future by pairing climate model projections with what we know of 

how nature responded to natural climate change in the past—such as during the 

glacial interglacial swings which preceded the stable climate ‘‘sweet spot’’ which has 

been so favorable to human civilization. We can anticipate multiple and massive 

mismatching and wrenching changes in the ecosystems on which we depend. It is 

quite clear from the fossil record that biological communities do not move as units 

like Birnam Wood in Macbeth, but rather that individual species move individually 

at different rates and sometimes in different directions as they attempt to track 

their required conditions. Basically ecosystems will disassemble and the individual 

species will assemble into novel biological communities: both a nightmare for natural resource managers as well as for the rest of us, as the shuffling of the ecological decks favors opportunistic species such as weeds, pests and diseases. 

It is already clear that there will be threshold changes in ecosystems. One clearcut example has been occurring in the coniferous forest of western Canada and the 

northwest United States. There, the naturally occurring pine bark beetle—always 

part of the ecosystem but held largely in check by other species, has had the balance 

tipped in its favor by a succession of mild winters and elevated summer night time 

temperatures. There has been massive die off of trees, the red color of which makes 

the landscape reminiscent of autumn color in New England (7). Even if it were not 

to spread farther (and there is no obvious biological barrier) it has had a huge impact on the timber industry and all species that live in those forest, as well creating 

conditions for forest fires of a magnitude we have never seen. 

Threshold changes and more gradual linear changes in ecosystems are driven not 

only by temperature difference but also by change in precipitation patterns. Obviously that will be a problem for freshwater ecosystems already coping with temperature change. In the American southwest there already is a dramatic example of a 

threshold change driven by a marked drop in precipitation: in northern Arizona 

drought has caused a complete die off of trees (8). 

It is important to note that the oceans and marine organisms are similarly vulnerable to climate change. (The United States has the greatest amount of marine 

environment of any Nation because of its extensive economic zones). Coral reefs 

prove to be particularly temperature sensitive and experience bleaching events in 

which the algal partner of the coral animals is ejected turning that Technicolor 

world into something approaching a black and white movie. Even more disturbing 

we have only recently learned (9) that the oceans are increasing in acidity because 

of the additional carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. This is essentially simple high 

school chemistry: the more CO2 in the atmosphere the more acid the oceans become. 

They are already 30 percent more acid (0.1 pH unit). Increasing acidity has profound implications for all organisms that build shells from calcium carbonate from 

corals to clams to tiny plankton at the base of most food chains. The calcium carbonate equilibrium is pH dependent. 

If this is the case with current climate change, there could be profound effects if 

climate change is allowed beyond that which is already programmed by current levels of greenhouse gas concentrations. All five of the global climate models for example show that with double pre-industrial levels of CO2 the sugar maple will no 

longer be able to exist in New England. That is not great news for lovers of maple 

sugar or autumn foliage. It is even worse news for those organisms that depend of 

the sugar maple as part of the northeastern deciduous forest. 

One of the biggest problems plants and animals will face is the highly modified 

landscape of modern times. In many instances landscapes will represent obstacles 

to organisms as they attempt to disperse and track their required conditions. In the 

case of organisms near the tops of mountains or on low islands, there will be nowhere to go but into thin air regardless of whether they are modified by human activity or not. This has already been noted in pika populations on individual mountains in the American west (10) and foreseen for the key deer with sea level rise 

(11). 

If this is the case with current climate change, there could be profound effects if 

climate change is allowed beyond that which is already programmed by current levels of greenhouse gas concentrations. This has led to a projection of extinctions from 

climate change (12). I am not here to defend the exact number, but the general 

point is that it is a large number if climate change is allowed to go on business as 

usual. 

The question then is where is the danger zone in climate change which should 

be avoided. Where to stop short? All biologists who have looked at the question believe that double pre-industrial CO2 would be disastrous for plants, animals, and 

ecosystems. There is some consensus among the conservation organizations that 450 
37 

parts per million should be the limit. I for one think that is probably too generous, 

impractical as that may seem with our current level being at 380. Now there is discussion around what is worse for wildlife: to go into the danger zone and then come 

down to something like 450 or below, or whether that brings dangers in itself. 

What is abundantly clear is that the living world on which we depend is far more 

sensitive than almost anything else to climate change. Life on earth is sending an 

urgent warning signal that climate change needs to be engaged with—and with an 

urgency and scale hitherto not contemplated. 

STATEMENT OF ROGER MANN, DIRECTOR FOR RESEARCH AND ADVISORY SERVICES, 

SCHOOL OF MARINE SCIENCE, VIRGINIA INSTITUTE OF MARINE SCIENCE, COLLEGE

OF WILLIAM AND MARY

Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, it is a pleasure to be here today in response to your invitation to provide testimony on Global Warming and Wildlife. 

My name is Roger Mann. I am a Professor of Marine Science and Director for Research and Advisory Services at the School of Marine Science, Virginia Institute of 

Marine Science, College of William and Mary. I have been a researcher examining 

natural ecosystems and their management for both ecological services and sustained 

harvest of commercially valuable products for over 30 years. While my primary 

focus has been on estuarine and coastal systems it is impossible to examine such 

systems without an appreciation of the biology of the complex watersheds that are 

the source of the rivers that feed these estuarine and coastal systems. Today I focus 

my remarks on the magnitude of predicted global warming events, and discuss wildlife impacts using examples from my adopted home State, the Commonwealth of 

Virginia. 

Global warming is a real phenomenon. Worldwide projections of temperature rise 

over the next century vary between 1.5o C and 5.5o C. A current scientific challenge 

is to refine models that were designed to make predictions at the global level and 

make them amenable to predictions at the regional level. There are roughly twenty 

different global models operating on about 14 supercomputers around the world that 

are focusing on these problems. At the regional level the models do a better job of 

predicting temperature than they do of predicting rainfall. The scenarios for Virginia in the coming century predict temperature increases from 3.5o C to as high 

as 6.5o C clustered in the summer months, but the accompanying overall rainfall 

patterns vary between drier and wetter in total amount, sometimes with a wetter 

spring but drier fall months, and often with more extreme rainfall events. Fresh 

water supply dominates much of what we see in wildlife biology. These warm and 

wet, or warm and dry scenarios have clear implications for change in natural populations in Virginia and elsewhere. 

I argue that Virginia is an excellent example of a natural laboratory in which to 

study the impacts of global warming, that impacts are becoming evident in all natural systems within the State, and that they are cause for concern. Virginia sits at 

a number of important biogeographic boundaries where animal and plant species, 

both terrestrial and aquatic, change in north-south and east-west directions. Climate, and particularly temperature, is a causative agent in determining these 

boundaries. A simple viewing of a weather map on the evening news illustrates the 

role of climate. In the winter the jet stream can dip in a southerly direction and 

cold air moves in from the mid-west and southern Canada. As the jet stream moves 

north, warmer air displaces the cold air. By contrast, summer weather is dominated 

by warm, humid air masses from the Gulf of Mexico. Gradual changes in the duration and extensions of these respective air masses in a north to south direction 

translates into shorter and warmer winters and/or longer and wetter summers. 

Again, both have implications for the natural populations. 

A transect from west to east across the landscape of Virginia includes the forested 

foothills of the Appalachians, the coastal plains that support a mixture of forestry 

and agriculture, freshwater wetlands whose values as filters of water have only recently been fully appreciated, tidal salty estuaries feeding the Chesapeake Bay with 

its fringing marshes, coastal barrier islands and the inner continental shelf. Remarkable diversity exists both along the transect and within each habitat type. Indeed, it is the rich biodiversity within local habitats that contribute to their stability. The plant and animal communities that occupy these habitats have evolved 

over geological time. The complex interaction between these community members is 

all important, and if there is a single message that I leave with you today it is that 

destabilizing the relationships between just a few of these contributing species can 

have a domino like effect resulting in large and deleterious impacts on the entire 

community. Consider as an analogy a spider’s web, all parts contributing to stability 
38 

in function. But break a limited number of strands and the web is weakened. Just 

a few more strands and the web collapses. A universal concern among biologists 

throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia is that global warming will unravel just 

a few of those strands with cascading impacts. 

Let me walk you from the Appalachians to the ocean shelf and provide just a few 

examples of our concern. 

• As summer temperatures increase there is expectation that forest species typical of the Appalachian foothills will move north and to higher altitude. Warmer 

temperatures in combination with lower rainfall favor conditions that promote fires 

and increase the probability that stressed trees will eventually succumb to insect 

and disease problems—especially so when insect species can migrate faster than 

trees. • All plants respond on a seasonal basis to both temperature and day length in 

their annual cycles of growth and reproduction. Changing the synchrony of these 

events by elevating temperature in a fixed sequence of day lengths can be expected 

to disrupt the equilibrium in forest communities. Insects play important roles in forest ecosystems as both food for higher tropic levels, such as birds and small mammals, and as destructive agents of trees. Warmer temperatures will both increase 

the range of destructive insects and alter insect life cycles; for example reducing 2- 

year life cycles to 1-year with obvious doubling of the impact on the host trees. Such 

situations have already been documented in western States where warming has allowed the pine borer beetle to move to higher latitudes and attack stands of 

lodgepole and ponderosa pines. Pine beetles now attack white bark pines, essential 

habitat for grizzly bears. • Changes in physical forest structure by the death of trees creates fragmentation 

of the footprints of forest growth on larger spatial scales. Disturbance at the edge 

of forested areas provides opportunity for invasive species, usually non-native to the 

Commonwealth but introduced over time either intentionally or by accident, to establish a foothold and eventually expand their range with displacement of native 

species. Non-native plant species often remain green through warmer periods that 

stress native forest plants, compounding their advantage in warmer conditions. Indeed, invasive species such as the Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus altissima), Japanese 

Honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica) and the Multiflora Rose (Rosa multiflora) have 

been documented to make up one half of the biomass in some stressed and invaded 

forest communities in Virginia. Changes in forest composition may pose grave problems for the many migratory birds that pass through the region. Virginia’s Department of Forestry closely monitors this situation. • Managed agricultural land in Virginia is richly used by wildlife. It is possible 

that climate and water conditions will help some commercial crops in the short run, 

but it is also likely that climate changes will lead to lower yields and many important food crops would be less nutritious. Maintenance of productivity on Virginia 

farms lands is a constant adaptive response to rainfall, temperature, and the vagaries of pests, parasites and weed species, many of which are invasive. A general increase in temperature will drive out native animals and encourage the spread of potentially destructive tropical plant and insect invasive species, such as, tropical soda 

apple (Solanum viarum), cogongrass (Imperata cylindrical), water hyacinth 

(Eichhornia crassipes), and pink hibiscus mealybug (Maconellicoccus hirsutus). The 

vigilance of Virginia’s Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services insures 

rapid response to local threats. • Invasive plants such as the common reed Phragmites australis threaten 

stressed freshwater marsh habitat resulting in significant change in community 

structure and opportunities for native wildlife. • Temperature and rainfall both drive in-stream river flow and water quality parameters that are central to successful growth and reproduction of freshwater fishes 

in Virginia rivers. • Divergence of long-term temperature and day length synchrony could impact 

food chains supporting resident fishes in rivers and streams. Studies in Seattle’s 

Lake Washington have demonstrated an advance in the timing of the spring plankton bloom with warming temperature; however, key zooplankton species (on which 

fish feed) that typically graze on the bloom have not changed their seasonal activity 

and now miss the optimal grazing period. Fish go hungry. 

• Estuaries are enormously complicated ecosystems, changing over time and 

across spatial scales. The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the Nation, with 

a watershed covering 8500 square kilometers, 60 percent of which are forested, and 

a resident population of over 15 million people. This water body is a national treasure in terms of its recreational, commercial and societal value. Oxygen solubility in 

seawater decreases as temperature increases creating an increasingly stressful environment for resident species living in shallow waters, but it can and does get worse 
39 

in deeper water. Each summer part of the main stem of the Bay stratifies as warmer, fresher water layers above denser, saltier water. The deep layers do not mix and 

their oxygen content is depleted— hypoxia (low oxygen) and eventually anoxia (no 

oxygen) dominate. Such deep regions have been described as dead zones. We know 

the dead zone is getting bigger each year and all the projections associated with 

global warming scenarios predict an increase in its size. • Dead zones force species that typically seek refuge in deeper, colder water into 

warmer shallower water where they suffer physiological stress. A prime example is 

the striped bass (Morone saxatilis). Ecologically important, recreationally and commercially valuable—a magnificent fish. We know that 80 percent of the striped bass 

in the Bay are infected with a disease called Mycobacteriois, but this is manifested 

predominantly in stressed fish. Warmer waters, we suspect, bring increases in the 

numbers of fish characterized by large skin lesions. • Submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) in the shallow waters of the bay form complex shallow water habitats that are critical for small crabs and fish. Bay SAV populations are under stress. The single dominant native SAV species, eelgrass (Zostera 

marina), is already at the southern end of its range and increased temperature contributes to its local instability. Indeed, a significant die off in eelgrass in 2005 has 

been related to local high water temperature. The prospect for displacement of the 

native eel grass by the more temperature tolerant widgeon grass (Ruppia maritima) 

is not comforting in that widgeon grass is more ephemeral in nature. • Oyster (Crassostrea Virginia) populations in the Bay have been ravaged over 

the past 4 decades by two diseases, commonly termed MSX (Haplosporidium 

nelsoni) and Dermo (Perkinsus marinus), whose activity is temperature dependent. 

Indeed increasing water temperature has been identified as the primary agent allowing the range extension of Dermo, with its deleterious impacts, from the Chesapeake Bay northwards to the Delaware Bay and Long Island Sound over the past 

two decades. Very large investments have and are being made to restore the Bay’s 

oyster resource and the industry that it supports. The added challenge of increased 

disease prevalence and intensity makes this task yet more difficult. 

• The Eastern Shore of Virginia is a critical feeding station on the Atlantic flight 

path for migratory birds. As food species are stressed, consider for example the 

value of horseshoe crab (Limulus polyphemus) eggs during breeding events between 

the tide lines, these bird populations face literal life and death situations. 

• On the inner continental shelf the bottom dwelling dominant species, the surf 

clam (Spisula solidissima, also a notable fishery resource) is changing in distribution. Forty years ago this species was abundant between the Virginia Capes and 

Cape Hatteras in North Carolina. Now, they are virtually absent south of the mouth 

of the Chesapeake Bay. The populations are increasingly being limited to more 

northerly and deeper waters by increasing summer water temperatures. We suspect 

this offshore migration describes the distribution of many Mid-Atlantic species. 

The addition of climate change to the mix of stressors already affecting valued 

habitats and endangered species will present a major challenge to future conservation of U.S. ecological resources. Across Virginia, from the Appalachians to the inner 

continental shelf, we are observing changes in natural populations of endemic plants 

and animals that can arguably be linked to global warming, and we expect trends 

to continue. As biologists we are concerned. As custodians of this rich natural resource we should all be concerned. 

STATEMENT OF DAVID H. STALLING, WESTERN FIELD COORDINATOR, 

TROUT UNLIMITED

Thank you for this opportunity to submit testimony regarding global warming and 

wildlife. More importantly, thank you for boldly taking on this vital, often controversial issue, and seeking solutions to the greatest challenge of our time. 

My name is David Stalling, and I live in Missoula, Montana. I am not a scientist 

or a wildlife biologist. However, I am an avid hunter, fisherman, backpacker, hiker, 

mountain biker, back country skier and snow boarder who deeply cherishes the 

wildlife and wildlands surrounding my home. That is what brought me to Montana 

when I was honorably discharged from the Marine Corps in 1986, and it’s what 

keeps me here. It’s my passion and love for wildlife and wild places—inspired by 

my hunting and fishing—that keeps me fighting for the conservation and protection 

of fish and wildlife habitat and the wild places that sustains them. Currently, I 

work as a grassroots organizer for Trout Unlimited, a national nonprofit dedicated 

to the protection of coldwater fisheries and watersheds. Prior to that, I worked for 

the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, another nonprofit dedicated to the protection 

of critical habitat for elk and other wildlife. I have also served two terms as Presi-
40 

dent of the Montana Wildlife Federation, Montana’s oldest and largest hunting, fishing and conservation organization, and often volunteer for the National Wildlife 

Federation. In addition, I write about wildlife, conservation and natural history for 

a variety of national magazines, helping people develop a better understanding of 

science and policy in regards to wildlife and wild places. 

The scientific evidence regarding climate change, and the consequences of humancaused release of global warming pollution, is conclusive and overwhelming, with 

even stronger evidence seeming to come forth every week. Those of us who are close 

to the land, and spend time among wildlife in wild places, are seeing much of this 

evidence first hand. 

Two summers ago, I hiked from my front porch in Missoula to Waterton, Alberta. 

During this eight-week, 800-mile backpack trip, mostly off trail, I only crossed three 

roads, traveling through the Rattlesnake, Mission Mountains, Bob Marshall, Great 

Bear and Scapegoat Wilderness Areas, and Glacier National Park. This is some of 

the wildest, most unique and precious country left in the United States, providing 

the last strongholds for rare, threatened and endangered species such as grizzly 

bears, wolves, mountain lions, lynx, wolverines and pure strains of Westslope cutthroat trout and bull trout. With strong populations of elk, mule deer, bighorn 

sheep, mountain goats, moose and other wildlife, these places also provide some of 

the best hunting and fishing left in the Nation. 

But even here, in such remote, wild places, I witnessed evidence of what scientists 

and wildlife biologists have been warning us about for years. Snowpacks, so crucial 

in the arid West for supplying water to our rivers and streams, are rapidly declining. Diminished water flows makes for shallower, warmer streams, with less oxygen, 

making it more difficult for coldwater fish such as trout to survive. Increasingly, the 

Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks are implementing summer closures of rivers to fishing to protect trout overly-stressed from hot, dry conditions. 

On my journey, I also saw large chunks of forest impacted by increased occurrence 

of mountain pine beetle, which scientists are linking to trees being less resistant 

to insect and disease because of drier, more stressful conditions, and was particularly concerned by the rapid death of most white bark pines, which provides an important food source for grizzlies and other wildlife. I also walked through large expanses of charred forests burned by recent wildfires. Our western forests evolved 

with, and are adapted well to fire. However, drier conditions, combined with an increase in dead trees from beetle infestations, are resulting in more frequent, more 

damaging fires than what historically and naturally occurred, with serious implications for wildlife. Towards the end of my adventure, while hiking through Glacier 

National Park, I could visible notice a profound decline in the size of glaciers I have 

visited in past trips. Many scientists are predicting the glaciers in the park will be 

gone within 10 years. 

I work with and speak to hunters, anglers, outfitters, guides, ranchers, county 

commissioners, tribal leaders and others throughout Montana and the West, and I 

hear similar reports and concerns from them about changes on the landscape, and 

its impacts to water, fish, wildlife and our western way of life. What I hear from 

fellow hunters and anglers is consistent with a recent survey commissioned by the 

National Wildlife Federation, examining the attitude of hunters and anglers regarding Global Warming; We hunters and anglers are witnessing the effects of global 

warming and believe immediate action is necessary to address it. Eighty five percent of us believe we have a moral responsibility to confront global warming, and 

eighty percent of us believe our Nation should be a world leader in addressing this 

issue. I am definitely among the 75 percent of hunters and anglers who agree that 

Congress should pass legislation that sets a clear national goal for reducing global 

warming pollution with mandatory timelines. 

Others can speak more authoritatively about the importance of these wild places, 

wildlife, and associated hunting, fishing and other recreational opportunities to the 

economy of Montana and the West. And it’s true. In Montana alone, more than one 

million people enjoy our State’s abundant wildlife each year, contributing more than 

$880 million to our State’s economy. But more importantly, our Nation’s wildlife and 

wild lands—along with related hunting, fishing and other outdoor recreational pursuits—provide unique cultural, social and even spiritual values not only for us Montanans, but for all Americans. This is why great American leaders such as Theodore 

Roosevelt fought so long and hard to protect what remained, in his day, of our Nation’s wildlife and wild places. Today, our wildlife and wildlands face threats that 

Roosevelt probably could never have fathomed. But I am confident he would not 

have shied away from the challenge. Neither should we. 

This is not, nor should be, a partisan issue. In Montana, I know Republicans, 

Democrats and Independents who all share a concern about global warming, and a 

desire to see something done about it. Thank you to those Senators and Congress-
41 

1http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/docs/WG1AR4—SPM—PlenaryApproved.pdf 

2Foote, A. L. 2005. Pp 65-68 (In) Conservation Hunting: People and Wildlife in Canada’s 

North. M Freeman, B Hudson and L Foote (Eds). Canadian Circumpolar Institute Occasional 

Publ No. 56. 3Adams, WM. 2004. Against extinction. Earthscan Press 

4Wenzel G. and M Dowsley p37-45 (In) Conservation Hunting: People and Wildlife in Canada’s North. M Freeman, B Hudson and L Foote (Eds). Canadian Circumpolar Institute Occas 

Publ. No. 56. 

men who are boldly taking steps to confront this issue. For those who are still not 

on board: I urge you to take a closer look at the scientific evidence and consensus, 

to listen to us citizens who are witnessing the impacts first hand, set aside partisan 

politics and various industrial and corporate pressures, and tackle this issue with 

the sense of urgency and immediacy required. We do, indeed, have a moral obligation to do what we can and as quickly as possible. 

I urge you to take immediate steps to curtail green house gas emissions; develop 

more conservative, responsible energy policies that include alternative and renewable sources of energy, more efficient ways of using energy, and reduce our need 

to burn fossil fuels. Even with immediate, yet important reductions in greenhouse 

gas emissions, changes will continue with negative impacts to fish, wildlife and wild 

places. Therefore, I also urge you to include, in legislation regarding climate change, 

funding specifically dedicated to help protect and restore fish and wildlife habitat 

through the Wildlife Conservation and Restoration account of the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act. 

As for my part, I will continue to do my best to help persuade and rally citizens 

to support your worthy efforts. I know that a majority of my fellow hunters and anglers in Montana, and elsewhere in our country, are already sending a message loud 

and clear: The time for action is now. 

Thank you, again, for this opportunity. 

STATEMENT OF A. LEE FOOTE, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA

INTRODUCTION

I speak today as an individual on the faculty of the University of Alberta and as 

a scientist with a circumspect overview of renewable and sustainable resource use. 

I have paid my way here from my private funds with no other donations or source 

of support. I am a citizen of both the US and Canada. 

Rationale for comments: 

(1) It is a unique opportunity to broaden the discussion of appropriate resource 

use which is the core of my professional life activities. 

(2) My southern country (USA) is poised to exert a pivotal influence on the livelihoods of Inuit citizens of my northern country (Canada) without full consideration 

of the implications. A ‘‘crack-the-whip effect’’ is developing whereby climate change 

may affect sea ice persistence which affects some polar bear habitats, which sparks 

endangered species policy which affects rural Inuit livelihood. There is approximately the same number of rural people as there are polar bears living in the polar 

bear’s range. I believe the culture and welfare of these Inuit, Inuvialuit, Greenlanders and Siberian subsistence users have received insufficient consideration in 

relation to polar bear management, particularly their role in resource management. 

(3) I remain concerned about possible misuse of science and logic in arguments 

around the polar bear/climate change debate. 

My history with sustainable use comes from participation, research and publication on community based natural resource management on three continents, and an 

advisory role in arctic research programs. From the 2007 IPCC projections1 I recognize and accept that climate has rapidly changed in the north. Finally, I am not 

a climatologist or a polar bear researcher and I have never sought or received grants 

or support for either of these topics. 

Errors in the application of climate change information to polar bear management 

Conservation connotes use of resources; otherwise, protection efforts are better 

classified as preservation2. Sustainable use principles are an appropriate framework 

for considering extractive use (hunting)3 of polar bears in light of concerns over 

habitat-driven changes in their habitats. The conditions that permit the carefully 

managed conservation hunting of polar bears are highly relevant in demonstrating 

sustainability4 as discussion proceeds with the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s 
42 

5http://pbsg.npolar.no/ 

6Pers coms Dr. Mitch Taylor, 3 February 2007. 

7 http://www.abcbirds.org/climatechange/ 8Stirling I, NJ Lund, and J Iocozza. 1999. Arctic 52:294-306. 

9Stirling, I 2002. Arctic 55 Supplement 1:59-76. 

10 http://pbsg.npolar.no/ 11http://www.grist.org/comments/interactivist/2007/01/15/siegel/index.html 

comment period on re-classifying the polar bear as an endangered species5. To add 

to this comment period it is important to consider error sources in the interpretation 

of risks to polar bears. 

Polar bear data is at risk of being misused in the following six ways, thus representing a rationale for not listing polar bears as endangered until better and more 

objective policy consideration has been completed. 

1. Errors of logic. Polar bears are being used as an icon of global climate change, 

yet populations of these bears are a response to, not a cause of climate change. Regardless of bear populations, climate will be unaffected by them, hence more protections for bears is illogical in remedying climate change. Simple association does not 

imply causation. 

2. Errors of insufficient data. Polar bears are an extremely adaptable and persistent species that have occupied the arctic for at least the last 120,000 years6 . Their range constitutes a circumpolar belt that, if it follows many other species 

range shifts, will have moved northward and southward in response to previous episodes of ice ages and climate warming conditions7. We need more information on 

the conditions leading to reductions in ice and in habitat quality at the southern 

fringes of polar bear range and whether a commensurate and offsetting improvement occurs at the northern fringe of the polar bear ranges. The hypothesis of shifting ranges needs extensive investigation by bear surveys in the poorly known northern ranges. For example, if healthy bears are found giving birth to triplets instead 

of twins in the north and skinny smaller bears are having singletons instead of 

twins in the south, evidence for population-wide compensation to climate may exist. 

3. Errors of conflation. The listing of polar bears as endangered is likely premature because there is insufficient data on most northern ranges to identify 

whether conditions are improving in response to climate change even as the southern fringes appear to be degrading. The knowledge of Hudson Bay (HB) bears is the 

best available for any polar bear subpopulation in existence8. The HB populations 

are the: 

(a) most southerly, 

(b) most accessible, 

(c) most handled, for example, 174 bears were anesthetized and helicopter ferried 

out of Churchill in 2005 alone (Tyrell), 

(d) most habituated to humans and human food as they spend months near thousands of people in Churchill, some of whom feed them. 

Extrapolation from the HB sub population to all other more northerly polar bear 

populations is inappropriate, yet this leap of conflation is commonly taken by the 

media. Understanding of the 17 other global polar bear subpopulations north of HB 

are less robust (but see reference9), yet, many polar bear biologists on the agree that 

some subpopulations are increasing, some are stable, and some are believed to be 

decreasing. 

4. Errors of bad faith. Charismatic species are useful for marketing perceptions 

of sports teams (Chicago Bears, Detroit Lions), retail products (Chevrolet Impala, 

polar bears for soft drinks) and causes (Free Willy, Born Free Foundation). Credibility is lost, however, when scientific knowledge is misused to achieve a political 

end such as unsubstantiated emotional appeals for polar bear survival when the ultimate goal is to influence U.S. energy policy. As one of those petitioning for ESA 

listing10 of polar bears said: ‘‘[the December 2006, ESA listing decision] gives me 

hope that we can get the United States to reduce greenhouse-gas pollution before 

it is too late to save the Arctic’’11. The goal of reducing climate change is honorable, 

the highly selective use of polar bear information for this is less so. 

5. Confusion of proximate and ultimate causes: The ultimate cause of polar bear 

population reductions (absolute decreases over decadal time frames) is habitat reduction, particularly less sea ice. In the absence of immediate proximate factors, the 

long-term population levels of polar bears will be determined by ultimate factors. 

Proximate factors may include reduced fecundity, cub abandonment, cannibalism, 

starvation, hunter harvests and increased energy demands from changing conditions. These sources of mortality are appropriate in that they reflect a form of population regulation to more closely match bear numbers with the ranges’ ability to 

support them. 
43 

12 Gissing, D. 2005. p 72 (In) Conservation Hunting: People and Wildlife in Canada’s North. 

Milton Freeman, Bob Hudson and Lee Foote (Eds). Canadian Circumpolar Institute Occas. Publication No. 56. 13 Dyck, MG and RK Baydak. 2006. Human Dimensions of Wildlife 11:143-145. 14Dr. Martina Tyrell—Unpublished Document 15Foote, AL and G Wenzel—Reciprocal benefits of polar bear hunting (In Press). 

6. Lack of specificity: The blanket listing of polar bears is a blunt and non-specific 

regulation that does not accurately target the threatened subpopulations of polar 

bears. The Endangered Species Act as applied to Grizzly Bears occurring on U.S. 

lands shows the flexibility to list the grizzlies in the coterminous States as endangered, yet those in Alaska as abundant enough for sustainable harvests and export. 

Even if this same mechanism were applied to polar bears, it redundantly mimics 

the Marine Mammals Protection Act that already provides protection for those specific populations most at risk and acknowledges the increases/stability where they 

are known for subpopulations.12

Polar bear watching 

Bears are powerful and potentially dangerous predators, so polar bear watching 

is rarely promoted as a tourist activity given the lack of amenities available in the 

polar bears’ territories. The principal place where polar bear watching has been developed (Churchill, Manitoba, the self-styled ‘Polar bear capital of the World’) is accessible by rail and air and hosts 6-8,000 tourists each fall to watch the bears from 

the safety of sturdy ’Tundra Buggies’ made from modified buses. Most bear observations are from 0-30 meters and bears are approached approximately every 10 minutes during the day.13

Tourist amenities are well-developed because Churchill hosts not only polar bear 

watchers, but visitors at other times of year who variously watch whales, arctic/subarctic birds, and the Aurora Borealis, and who attend courses at the Churchill 

Northern Studies Center, or to fish, hunt, or engage in ecotourism expeditions. 

In North Alaska a small number of tourists visit Barrow and Kaktovik where they 

observe whaling activities and view polar bears attracted to the whale carcasses. 

Churchill, Manitoba is unique in having good access, good concentrations of bears 

and tourist infrastructure. It is a highly valued experience available for $3,000- 

$6,000. This form of tourism is not widespread. For example, seeing a solitary bear 

in a remote arctic village (necessarily at a distance, for safety reasons) is less attractive than the opportunity available at Churchill, every day of the visit, to photograph dozens of bears at very close range. There have been problems with bear 

watching too. Tour operators are purported to attract bears with blocks of lard, by 

rubbing fish oils on the wheels of their tour buggies, and by hauling whale carcasses 

as attractants to nearby beaches to ensure client viewing opportunities. Habituated 

bears sometimes become nuisance bears, necessitating an identifying paint mark on 

their hide, sometimes temporary restraint in Churchill’s ‘‘bear jail’’ holding facility 

and occasionally helicopter translocation of bears to remote areas. In 2004 there 

were 174 bears helicopter-transported out of Churchill. The remote northern town 

of Arviat, 150 miles up the coast from Churchill was simultaneously beleaguered 

with nuisance polar bears, many of which carried an identifying paint mark on 

them14. In earlier times, polar bear hunting was a crucial management tool in remote villages and possibly structured the bear-human relationship in ways that no 

longer occur. 

Polar bear hunting 

In contrast to the bear-watching industry, polar bear hunters need almost no 

amenities beyond those available to local people. Visiting hunters spend very little 

time in the communities, yet contribute a significant source of revenue. A recent 

study of polar bear conservation hunting determined that the nine Inuit communities in Nunavut Territory who hosted visiting polar bear hunters received about 

$650,000 for allocating 15 percent of their subsistence quota to visiting hunters15. 

These revenues were paid out as wages (a guide may earn more than $7,000 for 

accompanying a hunter on a two-week hunt and may work three hunts per season), 

to the outfitter for making all arrangements, and to various community members 

for making suitable clothing, preparing the trophies for shipment, and for local purchases. 

For the local residents, polar bear hunting is culturally, socially, economically, 

and nutritionally important, and for those engaged in outfitting and guiding visiting 

hunters, that seasonal occupation provides meaningful employment at a time of year 
44 

16Keith, D. 2005. Inuit Qujimaningit Nanurnut; Inuit knowledge of polar bears. Canadian Circumpolar Institute Press. 17Wenzel G. and M Dowsley p37-45 (In) Conservation Hunting: People and Wildlife in Canada’s North. M Freeman, B Hudson and L Foote (Eds). Canadian Circumpolar Institute Occasional Publ. No. 56. 18Pokiak, F. p 52 (In) Conservation Hunting: People and Wildlife in Canada’s North. M Freeman, B Hudson and L Foote (Eds). Canadian Circumpolar Institute Occasional Publication No. 

56. 19Diduck, A, N Banks, D Clark, and D Armitage. 2005. Pp 269-290 in Breaking Ice, Berkes 

et al. (Eds). University of Calgary Press. 

when other jobs are scarce or non-existent16. Conservation hunts by foreign sportsmen do not increase the harvested numbers of bears; rather, foreign hunters purchase a small percentage of the harvest quota from participating communities. Reducing the number of U.S. sportsmen legally hunting polar bears would not result 

in fewer bears being killed as local hunters will, in every case, fully utilize the allotted tag numbers17. The loss of revenue from conservation hunts may actually increase demand for a larger Inuit subsistence quota to help offset the loss of needed 

revenue that visiting hunters brought into the community. The willingness to kill 

nuisance bears that approach remote villages is currently thwarted by the community’s recognition of the very high economic and social values seen in polar bears. 

In the absence of a lucrative hunting arrangement, the value of polar bears is likely 

to be reduced and bears near villages are more likely to be viewed as a nuisance 

than a valued resource.18

The polar bear technical committee (meeting in Edmonton 5-9 Feb 07) represents 

a very knowledgeable group with great expertise which will help lead the data collection and management of polar bear populations. Their collected wisdom is pivotal 

to our biological and distributional understanding. Native groups’ observations may 

strongly supplement this understanding through hypothesis formulation, mechanism of population change, and bear behaviors within a smaller geographic range. 

These cross-linkages have started and need to be encouraged19. Continued debate is essential for allocation of polar bear kills. This specific mortality factor is not considered a singular risk in the proposed ESA petition; therefore, if polar bears are re-classified as endangered, exemptions for managed harvest 

and importation are important considerations for the act. 

STATEMENT OF BRENDAN P. KELLY, ASSOCIATE VICE PRESIDENT FOR RESEARCH, UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA

Senator Lieberman and members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today on the impacts of climate change on Arctic wildlife. For the 

past 30 years, I have studied Arctic wildlife, primarily ice-associated marine mammals (whales, seals, and walruses). My studies have benefited by collaboration with 

colleagues in the scientific community and with Yupik and Inupiaq Eskimos who 

generously shared their knowledge and observations. Over millennia, Eskimo people 

evolved a rich culture around the seasonal sea ice and the plant and animal life 

that, in turn, had adapted to sea ice. 

In the late 1800s, immediately following the decimation of bowhead whale and 

walrus populations by commercial whalers, approximately 50 percent of the Eskimo 

population in the Bering Strait region starved to death. One hundred years later, 

I began learning about ice-associated animals from Native hunters such as Mr. Alex 

Akeya, a descendant of the survivors of the famine. By that time, the walrus population had recovered, the whales were recovering, but the Eskimo population remained below its historical size. 

The plants and animals that Alex and his kin depend on exist, of course, not in 

isolation but as part of an ecosystem. This particular ecosystem is dominated by 

seasonal sea ice which strongly influences the climate, oceanography, and biology 

of the Arctic Ocean and surrounding lands. 

Sea ice influences not only Arctic climate but, in fact, global climate in several 

ways, most notably through a mechanism first described to me by Mr. Akeya. He 

told me, as we traveled around St. Lawrence Island in his walrus skin boat, that 

in his language (Siberian Yupik) the island is named Savouqaq, a reference to the 

shape of the island. The island looks like something that has been wrung out like 

a wet rag. A Yupik creation story described raven diving to the bottom of the Bering 

Sea, taking mud in its beak, and, back at the surface, wringing out the mud to form 

the island. How, I asked Mr. Akeya, did his ancestors know that shape of this large 

island without benefit of an aerial view? His answer was that in the autumn, when 

the island is snow covered and the surrounding sea is not yet ice covered, an image 
45 

of the island occasionally is reflected up on to the cloud cover due to the high reflectivity of the snow in contrast to the low reflectivity of the water. Indeed, it is now 

known scientifically that sun and ice reflect over 90 percent of the incoming sunlight, while sea water absorbs over 90 percent of the sunlight. That differential reflection explains not only how ancient Yupiks knew the shape of Savouqaq, but it 

also contributes strongly to the faster rate of climate change experienced today in 

polar regions. One consequence of our warming climate is the melting of sea ice. 

Once that melt begins, it is accelerated by the resulting change in reflectivity. As 

the ice changes to water, the reflectivity of the surface goes from more than 90 percent to less than 10 percent resulting in further warming, more ice melt, and yet 

a further decrease in reflectivity. The importance of this polar amplification effect 

to global climate can be appreciated when the surface area of the polar seas—as 

much as 34,000,000 km2 in the recent past—is taken into account. 

Sea ice strongly influences winds and water temperature, both of which are key 

determinants of upwelling, the oceanographic phenomenon whereby nutrient rich 

water is brought up to depths at which there is sufficient sunlight for phytoplankton 

to make use of those nutrients. 

The Bering Sea produces our Nation’s largest commercial fish harvests as well as 

supporting subsistence economies of Alaskan Natives. Ultimately, the fish populations depend on plankton blooms controlled by the extent and location of the ice 

edge in spring. Naturally, many other organisms, such as seabirds, seals, walruses, 

and whales, depend on primary production, mainly in the form of those plankton 

blooms. As Arctic sea ice continues to diminish, the location, timing, and species 

make-up of the blooms is changing in ways that appear to favor a different kind 

of ecosystem. While much of Bering Sea’s production ends up in a bottom-dwelling 

community of clams, crabs, and other organisms favored by walruses, gray whales, 

bearded seals, and eider ducks, the altered ecosystem may instead favor organisms 

living in the water column. The result would be a radically altered community of 

organism favoring a different suite of upper level consumers. The subsistence and 

commercial harvests of fish could be altered radically. 

Ecosystem changes, of course, will be profound and effect more components than 

the fish. Many changes already have been observed and are predicted to accelerate 

along with the rates of climate change. The changes to the Arctic sea ice ecosystem 

will be especially rapid and profound. In my 30 years studying that system, we already have lost over 25 percent of the summer ice cover. 

My colleagues in the scientific community are working diligently to understand 

the manifold impacts of our changing climate. There is a real sense of urgency given 

the pace of change and the tremendous economic and social impacts that will ensue. 

Many of the changes will not be obvious or, seemingly, even counterintuitive. Two 

examples involving marine mammal species may be illustrative. 

Walruses feed on clams and other bottom-dwelling organisms. Over a nursing period of two or more years, the females alternate their time between attending a calf 

on the ice and diving to the bottom to feed themselves. The record ice retreats observed in recent summers increasing are extending beyond the continental shelf 

such that the ice is over water too deep for the female walruses to feed. Thus, the 

habitat suitable for adult feeding is becoming disconnected from the suitable nursing habitat. The prediction is for walrus populations to once again decline. 

Counter-intuitively, ringed seals, the major prey of polar bears and an important 

resource to Arctic Eskimos, face the prospect of freezing deaths as a consequence 

of global warming. Ringed seals give birth in snow caves excavated above breathing 

holes they maintain in the sea ice. The snow caves protect the pups from extreme 

cold and to a large extent from predators. As the climate warms, however, snow 

melt comes increasingly early in the Arctic, and the seals’ snow caves collapse before 

the pups are weaned. The small pups are exposed without the snow cover and die 

of hypothermia in subsequent cold periods. The prematurely exposed pups also are 

more vulnerable to predation by arctic foxes, polar bears, gulls, and ravens. Furthermore, gulls and ravens are arriving increasingly early in the Arctic as springs become warmer, further increasing their potential to prey on the seal pups. 

The net effect of climate change inevitably will be major changes to the ecosystem. 

Some species will become extinct, others will adapt to new habitats. Indeed, the history of the earth has involved many ecosystem changes and extinctions. Whether 

the changes underway today will be survived by walruses, seals, Eskimo culture, 

our economies and ways of life, will depend critically on the pace of change. Adaptation—biological or social—requires time for adjustment. The current rates of change, 

however, are very steep. 
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