Polar bears are getting FATTER & HEALTHIER amid disappearing sea ice — scientists admit they’re “surprised” and “stunned” by the reversal!

Polar bears are now adding new foods to their diet, including reindeer, walruses and bird eggs

A male polar bear walks on the sea ice near glaciers in eastern Spitzbergen, in the Svalbard archipelago, on April 9, 2025.Credit : OLIVIER MORIN/AFP via Getty

NEED TO KNOW

Despite the decline of sea ice over the past several decades due to climate change, scientists found that some polar bears are healthy and thriving
A new study found that polar bears on the Arctic Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard gained weight over the past 20 years
Bears in the region are now adding new foods to their diet, including reindeer, walruses, and bird eggs

Despite the decline of sea ice over the past several decades due to climate change, scientists are reporting a surprising discovery about some Arctic polar bears — they’re healthy and thriving.

According to a study published in the journal Scientific Reports, scientists who tracked the weight and size of nearly 800 polar bears between 1992 and 2019 found that the mammals have been able to gain plenty of weight — despite predictions that melting sea ice would make it harder for them to hunt down food, as the number of ice-free days increased by 100 during the course of the study.

Jon Aars, a senior scientist with the Norwegian Polar Institute who authored the study, spoke with CBS News and the New York Times and shared just how surprised researchers were after finding that bears living on the Arctic Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard were in good physical shape and could hunt and raise cubs successfully.

Jon Aars, Norwegian veterinarian Rolf Arne Olberg and others measure a big male polar bear in eastern Spitzbergen, in the Svalbard archipelago, on April 17, 2025.OLIVIER MORIN/AFP via Getty

“When I started, if you asked me, ‘What do you think will happen?’, I would assume they would be struggling, and they would get leaner, skinnier, and maybe you would see effects on reproduction and survival,” Aars told the Times. “That was wrong.”

A polar bear, one of the Arctic animals, walks on the glacier in Svalbard and Jan Mayen, located in the Arctic.Sebnem Coskun/Anadolu via Getty

For the study, researchers compared the body condition index — which measures the bear’s weight and fat content — with the rate of nearby sea ice melting. They found that bears were gaining weight as the ice levels dropped.

“A fat bear is a healthy bear,” Aars told CBS News.

According to the scientist, some of the 2,650 polar bears in Svalbard have adapted to the receding ice by turning to land-based food sources.

Historically, they have hunted seals as well as other mammals and some birds, but Aars says polar bears in Svalbard are now eating reindeer and walruses, which have both been protected from hunting in recent years, as well as entirely new foods like bird eggs.

“I was quite surprised, because we have lost so much sea ice since I started,” said Aars, who began researching polar bears in 2003. “… I think what this shows is they need less sea ice than we thought.”

“[Polar bears] have always been able to do the best of the situation and find new ways to do things,” he added to the Times.

A male polar bear bear walks on the sea ice near glaciers in eastern Spitzbergen, in the Svalbard archipelago, on April 9, 2025.Olivier MORIN / AFP via Getty

Despite the positive findings, Aars cautioned that the bears’ newly-discovered weight gain could be temporary, as the Arctic is warming several times faster than the rest of the planet.

In the Barents Sea, which surrounds Svalbard, temperatures have risen by 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit since 2000, and the nearby sea ice has declined faster than anywhere else home to polar bears.

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According to Aars, much more research is needed to understand how other polar bears are adapting to climate change — and scientists are still unsure whether the polar bears of Svalbard can maintain their reindeer- and walrus-based diet.

“Bears are still able to cope with the situation as it is today,” he told CBS. “The bad news is that predictions [are that] we’re going to lose sea ice fast in Svalbard.”

“There will be a line, and when it’s crossed, we will see polar bears starting to lose weight and getting more problems surviving and reproducing,” Aars added to the Times. “We do not know how profound this change will be, and we don’t know if it will be happening in 5, or 10 or 20 years.”