Global warming poster child: polar, um I mean, the grizzly bear

While melting glaciers and endangered polar bears get all the press, there are numerous other "canary in the coal mine" occurrences that serve to illustrate the effects of global warming.

A NY Times article features the Rocky Mountain ecosystem - exploding beetle populations, dying pine trees, and grizzly bears. The avg temperature is becoming increasingly favorable for mountain pine beetles, which love to kill whitebark pines, and whitebark pines are a favorite staple of the grizzly bear's diet. So no pines = no bears.

There are efforts towards saving the grizzlies and there's talk of putting them on the endangered species list along with their white coated brethren up north, but saving one species - be it polar or grizzly bear - will require saving thousands of other not as furry or photogenic species that are dependent on that same declining ecosystem.

So pick your bear to get people to donate to the cause, but remember the bear can't live without its habitat.

My previous related posts on the whole ecosystem/species/industry link:
We killed the baiji
Organic fish?
Wheeling and dealing with the timber industry
It takes a polar bear