ABOUT THE MV ARCTIC SUNRISE, ANTARCTICA – Looking through binoculars from an inflatable boat bobbing in frigid waters, polar ecologists Michael Wethington and Alex Borowicz scan a rocky outcrop above AntarcticAndersson Island of Andersson Island with colonies of sepia bird droppings could signal a nearby colony of penguins.
The birds have become an iconic symbol of the icy south of the earth. Scientists now use them as key indicators for understanding climate change near Antarctica – with some western regions like the Antarctic Peninsula experiencing rapid warming, while East Antarctic still cold and freezing.
Borowicz, of Stony Brook University in New York, said: “We’re counting penguin nests to see how many penguins are in a flock, giving birth to chicks each year, and whether that number increases or decreases accordingly. environmental conditions”.
For climatologists, nothing is easy in the remote and icy regions of Antarctic. But penguins are easier to track than other species because they nest on land and their black feathers and droppings can be detected on white ground.
Wethington, also of Stony Brook, said: ‘We can use the penguins as a bioanalyzer to see how the rest of the ecosystem is doing.
Simple penguin populations along with other methods such as analysis of satellite imagery tell a nuanced story, with some penguin species being named ‘winners’ when it comes to climate change. climate opens up new habitats, while others are forced to seek colder climates.
Waves of ‘GENTOOFICATION’
Gentoo penguins, with their bright orange-red beaks and distinctive white patches on their heads, can partially live in open water without surrounding undulating icebergs.
As temperatures on the Antarctic Peninsula began to rise faster than almost anywhere else in the world during the second half of the 20th century, gentoo populations expanded southward in what some scientists call “gentoofication.” belong to Antarctic.
“Gentoo penguins don’t like sea ice,” said David Ainley, a biologist with ecological consulting firm HT Harvey & Associates, who has studied penguins for more than 50 years. “They mainly feed on the continental shelf and don’t go far out to sea.”
As sea ice fell along the western side of the peninsula, the townspeople took advantage of the hospitable conditions. But similar conditions were worse for the vested Adelies, who depended on sea ice to breed and feed.
“When we find Adelie penguins, we usually know that sea ice is nearby,” Wethington said. “And whenever we see sea ice decline or completely disappear, then we will see corresponding Adelie penguin populations decline dramatically.”
Although the population of the common Adelie penguin is increasing in numbers overall, some populations have decreased by more than 65%.
‘SAFETY SPACE’
During a January expedition to the area, Stony Brook scientists discovered that the frozen Adelie colonies around the Weddell Sea have remained stable over the past decade.
“The peninsula can be a safe space as we see climate change taking place and general warming around the globe,” Wethington said.
Heather Lynch, an ecologist at Stony Brook University who helped lead the expedition aboard the MV Arctic Sunrise, said the findings highlight the area’s conservation value.
In 2020, a team from the British Antarctic Survey discovered 11 new emperor penguin colonies from satellite images, a 20% increase in the number of known emperor penguin colonies.
But since 2016, nearly every chick has died in the Halley Bay colony along the easternmost end of the Weddell Sea, long home to the world’s second-largest colony of emperor penguins, with about 25,000 breeding pairs gather annually.
Scientists suspect the 2016 El Niño event changed sea ice dynamics in the region and worry for penguins as climate change increases the frequency and severity of El Niño events .
Peter Fretwell, a geographic information scientist at the British Antarctic Survey, said the chick deaths were not a direct result of climate change, but had a climate change dimension. consequences for this loss.
