Scientists have observed marked changes in the hunting strategy of polar bears, with the ever-decreasing ice-cap seeing the predators look at a variety of different food sources.

Researchers from Poland have studied the hunting schedule of the polar bear and recorded rare footage of a bear drowning a reindeer as a food source.

The footage filmed in Norway’s under-threat Svalbard region shows a polar bear swimming after a reindeer and then dragging it out to shore. Traditionally polar bears have fed largely on seals, but a report in the Polar Biology suggests that the melting pilar ice caps are changing the diets of the bears, making them hunt more on land, and having thus far unknown effects on the food chain.

“When on ice, polar bears occasionally hunt ice-locked cetaceans and walruses resting on beaches,” said the report.

“Polar bears compelled by the shrinking sea ice extent to stay longer on land, where access to seals is limited, feed opportunistically on whatever resources are available, e.g., dead fish and cetaceans washed ashore, but also numerous terrestrial mammals from rodents to reindeer. They may also explore landfills near settlements containing offal and the remains of marine mammals hunted by local people.”

The new comes as research published in the New Scientist this week suggested that the Arctic region may switch from a snow environment to one dominated by rain over the next 40 years, two decades earlier than previously expected.

As well as devastating local wildlife, the expected melt will have huge impact on global warming and sea level rises. There are also issues whereby less snowfall on the ice-caps could make the planet less reflective and impact whether Earth reflects or absorbs harmful rays.