NUNAVUT - Researchers are working on a method of tracking polar bears that doesn't require tranquilization, according to Queen's University researcher Dr. Peter de Groot.

"We're saying we can put that sort of data estimate using traditional knowledge of tracks, genetics from non-invasive sampled individuals and feces," de Groot said.

The approach uses three methods to track the bears, he said.

The first involves setting up sampling stations on the sea ice. The stations form a square made of four metal poles and wire that catches the polar bear's fur after it eats bait placed in the middle.

"We erect these sampling stations and we put a piece of bait in the middle and the bears come and investigate the bait and they eat it and take it," he said. "When they come into the sampling station they leave snags of hair on the barb and it's that hair that we take to the lab and do genetic analysis on."

He said the fur and fecal samples will help to provide a polar bear population estimate.

"Coupled with hair samples we should be able to get some idea of how many bears are around where we set our traps and where we pick up the feces," he said.

The second and third methods involve analyzing polar bear tracks. De Groot said hunters are having their traditional knowledge evaluated for the first time.

"Some of the hunters can identify age, sex and size from footprints," de Groot said.

"So we get about eight active hunters from Gjoa Haven, Cambridge Bay and Taloyoak and we get them to view 79 of the same tracks on the sea ice and we see if they make the same call."

De Groot said the plan also involves taking a photograph of the tracks so Inuit diagnosis can be combined with analysis by track experts.

"We're working with people that look at the tracks of lions and leopards and tigers," he said. "We're trying to get a method where the hunters can photograph the track and we can analyze them multi-variantly to see if this track is different from another bear track."

De Groot said the method is simple enough to repeat each year and costs much less than a normal aerial survey.

"We can almost provide the same kind of data, obviously a much smaller coverage than with a helicopter, but still a helicopter costs so much money they can only do one management unit at a time every 13 years.

"We're saying these are so quick and easy that we should be able to monitor our bears everywhere annually."

The project is in its fourth year and is funded by the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board, NTI, the Polar Continental Shelf Project, the National Science and Engineering Research Council, and Queen's University, de Groot said.

Gabriel Nirlungayuk, director of wildlife for NTI said about six years ago, polar bear hunters in Gjoa Haven and Cambridge Bay were not permitted to hunt because of concern about the population in that area.

"The scientific evidence at the same time where they showed drastic reduction in population for McClintock Channel, the Gulf of Boothia was increasing by the same amount of polar bears," he said. "I always say it doesn't take a polar bear scientist to figure it out perhaps these guys moved elsewhere."

De Groot said he hopes the new method will dispel old myths about polar bear populations and provide an accurate estimate.

"Our method is going to hopefully allow them to fairly inexpensively put to bed some of these contrasting claims between the abundance of bears," he said.

Nirlungayuk said the new method is good news for polar bear hunters because no tranquilizers are used during the research.

"It's a concern for hunters to utilize the meat that has been tranquilized and the policy has been that you can't consume the meat for a year," Nirlungayuk said. "It's non-intrusive way of collecting some DNA evidence and where Inuit are identifying the sex of the bear with its tracks," he said.

De Groot said a survey of the entire McClintock Channel was conducted this year. He said it will take another year to determine the outcome of the analysis of the Inuit knowledge portion, but the plan is to conduct surveys each year.

"We know the genetics works, we need to know the strengths and weaknesses of the track data and you synthesize that together and you say, 'Alright, every year we want four or five guys to go run the surveys and tell us how many bears are out there, run it again the next year and the next year.'

"After a couple years you're getting a sense of what the bear population is doing."