Tom Nelson is having some fun with uber-ecoperson Bill McKibben who has been tweeting about an AP story in SFGate about a huge congregation of walruses on the coast of Alaska. SFGate helpfully provides a photo:

According to the story, this so-called `haulout' is down to climate change:

The gathering of walrus on shore is a phenomenon that has accompanied the loss of summer sea ice as the climate has warmed.

Which is the kind of statement to get McKibben going of course.

Unfortunately for McKibben, Tom helpfully points out that the photo was taken at a walrus sanctuary that was founded in 1960. And that the first description of a walrus, dating back to 1604, was of a beach haulout at a place called Bear Island.

Now I suppose one might be able to make a case that more walruses were coming ashore because of global warming and receding sea ice, but one would have to demonstrate this somehow, perhaps by reference to global populations. Merely asserting that it is so does not cut the mustard.

Unless you are Bill McKibben.