Its Tough All Over For Polar Bears

One objection climate change skeptics raise in regards to the attention paid the Polar Bear--for example, attempts to have them designated an endangered species-- is that, for many sub-populations, there is too little data available to determine the status of the animal. For example:

2) the Chukchi/Bering Sea population (CB, shared with Russia, half in US territory) is tentatively estimated at 2,000 ─ no population survey has yet been done (Aars et al. 2006).

Well, perhaps there has been no survery, but it seems the Chukchi population is indeed threatened:

Polar bears are dying out in the remote Arctic region of Chukotka because of melting ice and increased killing by humans, an expert with the International Fund for Animal Welfare warned on Friday.

The guy doing the warning here is Nikita Ovsyanikov, whose spent a couple of decades studying the bears around Wrangle Island, off the Coast of Russia. Here are a few of his articles on the subject.