Ian Stirling

Ian Grote Stirling OC FRSC (born September 26, 1941) is a research scientist emeritus with Environment and Climate Change Canada and an adjunct professor in the University of Alberta Department of Biological Sciences. His research has focused mostly on Arctic and Antarctic zoology and ecology, and he is one of the world's top authorities on polar bears. Stirling has written five books and more than 150 articles published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. He has written and spoken extensively about the danger posed to polar bears by global warming.

Ian Stirling was born to Andrew and Margaret Stirling on September 26, 1941. He completed his B.Sc. at the University of British Columbia (UBC) in 1963, and his M.Sc. in zoology at UBC in 1965. For his M.Sc. thesis, Stirling studied captive blue grouse under James F. Bendell. Under the advice of Ian McTaggart-Cowan, Stirling then enrolled in a Ph.D. program at the University of Canterbury, where he studied the population ecology of Weddell seals in Antarctica under Bernard Stonehouse. Stirling obtained his Ph.D. in 1968.

From 1970 to 2007, Stirling served as a research scientist for the Canadian Wildlife Service, focusing his research on polar bears, most notably on a long-term study of polar bears in western Hudson Bay near Churchill, Manitoba. He was among the first to draw attention to the potential impacts of climate change on polar bears. Stirling retired in 2007.

Stirling has served as a member of the Committee of Scientific Advisors of the Marine Mammal Commission, and he was the first Canadian to be elected president of the Society for Marine Mammalogy. He is a long-standing member of the IUCN Polar Bear Specialist Group and currently acts as a scientific advisor to Polar Bears International.

• Officer of the Order of Canada (2000)
• Northern Science Award, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (2002)
• Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (2007)
• D.Sc., University of British Columbia (2013)
• Kenneth S. Norris Lifetime Achievement Award (2013)
• Weston Family Prize for Lifetime Achievement in Northern Research (2015)

• Stirling I (1997) The importance of polynyas, ice edges, and leads to marine mammals and birds. Journal of Marine Systems 10, 9–21.
• Stirling I, Lunn NJ, Iacozza J (1999) Long-term trends in the population ecology of polar bears in western Hudson Bay in relation to climatic change. Arctic 52, 294–306.
• Stirling I, Parkinson CL (2006) Possible effects of climate warming on selected populations of polar bears (Ursus maritimus) in the Canadian Arctic. Arctic 59, 261–275.
• Stirling, I (2011) Polar Bears: The Natural History of a Threatened Species. Fitzhenry and Whiteside. Markham, ON. 334 pp.
• Stirling I, Durocher AE (2012) Effects of climate warming on polar bears: a review of the evidence. Global Change Biology 18, 2694–2706. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2486.2012.02753.x