Polar bears are modifying their diets to adapt to climate change

Polar bears have shown that they will be able to survive the ice melting by changing their diet and adapting to the new climate.

Polar bears are often thought as the animal that is most effected by global warming, but new research has shown that when the food they prefer is not available, the bears are willing to change their diet, according to the International Business Times. Though they prefer seal, in times when they are not available researchers have found they will eat caribou, snow geese, grass seed and berries.

"What our results suggest is that polar bears have flexible foraging strategies," Linda Gormezano, and a co-author of the study said. This does not change the fact that polar bears are obviously effected by the climate, but it does show that polar bears are much more flexible in their diet than previously thought.

Though this flexibility is certainly surprising and will have advantages for the bears, it is unlikely that this diet change will completely save the polar bears from the changing climate, according to Headlines and Global News. Global warming is still causing population decrease as well as a scarcity of food for polar bears.

For an animal the size of a polar bear, berries and grass probably aren’t going to be able to sustain the 1,500 pound animal. The bears will have to find other stapling sources of food.