Scientists are tracking polar bears to keep them -- and people safe

Transcript

A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:

As the Arctic region warms, polar bears are spending more time on land because the sea ice, where polar bears live and hunt, is breaking apart.

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

As a result, they are now more likely to encounter people. And that's not a good thing.

MARTÍNEZ: So a team of scientists at York University in Canada came up with a new tool to track the location of polar bears. It's a device that attaches to the animal's fur. But how does that happen?

TYLER ROSS: So obviously we want the bears to be asleep when we're doing this.

MARTIN: Tyler Ross is the lead researcher. He says first they sedate the polar bears from a helicopter. Then they move in to place their tracker. It resembles a tiny baseball diamond with holes drilled into it. They call it a fur burr.

ROSS: And we pull the polar bear's hair through each one of those holes, slip on a little copper tube that we then crimp, or pinch, and it ends up looking like a little ponytail.

MARTÍNEZ: Five or 10 little ponytails around the base of the device work together like a GPS AirTag. And that allows researchers to follow groups of polar bears and issue a warning if they get too close to places people live.

ROSS: Just so happened to be right in the pathway of these bears as they migrate north during the fall. And for several weeks, this is pretty much their sole focus is deterring bears from the community.

MARTIN: Ross says the fur tags eventually fall off on their own, so they're less invasive than ear tags and collars. They also help researchers collect more information from male bears.

ROSS: The GPS collars don't actually fit around the necks of the male bears. Their necks are wider than their heads. That's where these tags fill another important niche.

MARTIN: Keeping both bears and people safe.

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