East Antarctica's Adelie penguin population more than double previous estimate

ANTARCTICA – Scientists have their best estimate yet of how many Adélie penguins live in East Antarctica, numbering almost six million, 3.6 million more than previously estimated.

The new research by a team of Australian, French and Japanese scientists used aerial and ground surveys, tagging and resighting data, and automated camera images over several breeding seasons.

The researchers focused on a 5000 kilometre stretch of coastline in East Antarctica, estimating 5.9 million birds and extrapolating that out to likely global estimate of 14–16 million birds.

Genetics reveals where emperor penguins survived the last ice age

A group of emperor penguins is resting and preening
 next to a tide crack in the ice near the Gould Bay colony.
Credit: Dr Tom Hart

ANTARCTICA - A study of how climate change has affected emperor penguins over the last 30,000 years found that only three populations may have survived during the last ice age, and that the Ross Sea in Antarctica was likely the refuge for one of these populations.

The Ross Sea is likely to have been a shelter for emperor penguins for thousands of years during the last ice age, when much of the rest of Antarctica was uninhabitable due to the amount of ice.

The findings, published on 1 March in the journal Global Change Biology, suggest that while current climate conditions may be optimal for emperor penguins, conditions in the past were too extreme for large populations to survive.

Count Antarctic penguins from the comfort of your armchair

An automated camera set up by
the Australian Antarctic Division at
Whitney Point near Casey station.
Photo credit: Colin Southwell

ANTARCTICA - Always wanted to count penguins in Antarctica? Well now you can, with the Penguin Watch project, launched today by University of Oxford.

The project, led by ‘penguinologist’ Dr Tom Hart, is part of broader penguin health research, which needs volunteers to count penguins in thousands of photographs taken by automated cameras monitoring colonies for Australian Antarctic Division and UK scientists.

Online volunteers will count adults, chicks and eggs in photographs from some 30 Antarctic and subantarctic colonies of gentoo, chinstrap, king, emperor and Adélie penguins.

Antarctic emperor penguins may be adapting to warmer temperatures

Emperor penguin colony from the air.
Photo credit: Ian Potten

ANTARCTICA - A new study of four Antarctic emperor penguin colonies suggest that unexpected breeding behaviour may be a sign that the birds are adapting to environmental change.

Analysis of satellite observations reveals that penguin colonies moved from their traditional breeding grounds on the thin layer of ice (sea ice) to the much thicker floating ice shelves that surround the continent during years when the sea ice formed later than usual.

Ancient penguin history on the agenda this Australian Antarctic season

AUSTRALIA - This Antarctic summer, Australian Antarctic Division seabird ecologist Dr Barbara Wienecke will head a "penguin archaeology" project on abandoned Adélie penguin sites to try to find out whether the birds’ diet may have changed over the past few thousand years.

Satellites provide first ever census for emperor penguins

Emperor penguins on the sea ice
close to Halley Research Station.
Photo credit: British Antarctic Survey

ANTARCTICA – A new study using satellite mapping technology reveals there are twice as many emperor penguins in Antarctica than was previously thought.

The results provide an important benchmark for monitoring the impact of environmental change on the population of this iconic bird. Emperor penguins breed in areas that are very difficult to study because they are remote and often inaccessible with temperatures as low as −50°C (−58°F).

Reporting in the journal PLoS ONE, an international team of scientists describe how they used Very High Resolution satellite images to estimate the number of penguins at each colony around the coastline of Antarctica.

Using a technique known as pan-sharpening to increase the resolution of the satellite imagery, the science teams were able to differentiate between birds, ice, shadow and penguin guano. They then used ground counts and aerial photography to calibrate the analysis.

Lead author and geographer Peter Fretwell at British Antarctic Survey (BAS), which is funded by the UK’s Natural Environment Research Council, explains, “We are delighted to be able to locate and identify such a large number of emperor penguins. We counted 595,000 birds, which is almost double the previous estimates of 270,000–350,000 birds. This is the first comprehensive census of a species taken from space.”

On the ice, emperor penguins with their black and white plumage stand out against the snow and colonies are clearly visible on satellite imagery. This allowed the team to analyse 46 emperor penguin colonies around the coast of Antarctica, including seven that were previously unknown.

“The methods we used are an enormous step forward in Antarctic ecology because we can conduct research safely and efficiently with little environmental impact, and determine estimates of an entire penguin population, said co-author Michelle LaRue from the University of Minnesota and funded by the US National Science Foundation.

“The implications of this study are far-reaching: we now have a cost-effective way to apply our methods to other poorly-understood species in the Antarctic, to strengthen ongoing field research, and to provide accurate information for international conservation efforts.”

BAS biologist and co-author Dr Phil Trathan noted, “Current research suggests that emperor penguin colonies will be seriously affected by climate change. An accurate continent-wide census that can be easily repeated on a regular basis will help us monitor more accurately the impacts of future change on this iconic species.”

Scientists are concerned that in some regions of Antarctica, earlier spring warming is leading to loss of sea ice habitat for emperor penguins, making their northerly colonies more vulnerable to further climate change.

Dr Trathan continued, “Whilst current research leads us to expect important declines in the number of emperor penguins over the next century, the effects of warming around Antarctica are regional and uneven. In the future we anticipate that the more southerly colonies should remain, making these important sites for further research and protection.”

The research is a collaboration between British Antarctic Survey, University of Minnesota/National Science Foundation, Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Australian Antarctic Division.

PloS ONE citation

An emperor penguin population estimate: the first global, synoptic survey of a species from space, Fretwell PT, LaRue MA, Morin P, Kooyman GL, Wienecke B, et al. (2012). PLoS ONE 7(4): e33751. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0033751

Sources

Scientists count penguins from space, 13 April 2012, British Antarctic Survey

Scientists determined first-ever census for emperor penguin, 13 April 2012, National Science Foundation

Lights, camera, Antarctic penguin action!

ANTARCTICA - You might think that living at the ends of the earth would keep you from society's prying eyes. But that isn't the case for Antarctica's remote residents - Adelie penguins.

For the past six summers, cameras set up by scientists from the Australian Antarctic Division have recorded the lives of Adelies nesting near the Australian stations of Mawson, Davis and Casey along the the East Antarctic coast.

This summer, the scientists intend to extend the camera network even further with a camera in Cape Denison in Commonwealth Bay, and eventually want to see an international network of such cameras across Antarctica. To this end, the Australian Antarctic Division has given two cameras to French and US researchers to trial them on the Antarctic Peninsula.

The cameras are solar-powered, so they begin rolling when daylight returns to Antarctica in October. This allows the scientists to see what the penguins are up to long before weather conditions allow them to conduct fieldwork. The cameras then take photos daily until the end of the breeding season, when the darkness comes back and the penguins return to sea. They can operate over a number of years and save the expense of researchers observing the penguins in the field.

"Cameras will give us an idea of breeding success, with daily photographs allowing us to count nests at the beginning of the season and the number of chicks at the end of the season," Australian Antarctic Division ecologist Colin Southwell told AAP.

Dr Southwell and his team will use the data from the camera network along with older surveys and records to build a more definitive picture of changes in the Adelie populations over the past 30 years, and to then use those to explore and identify the drivers of those changes.

Sources
Scientists train cameras on Adelie penguin by Lloyd Jones, 13 January 2012, Ninemsm
Penguin-cam to keep watch on the waddlers by Jo Chandler, 30 December 2011, The Sydney Morning Herald