On thin ice. One emperor penguin population may be headed toward extinction.
Credit: Samuel Blanc
Posted on 01/27/2009 11:25:10 PM PST by neverdem
On thin ice. One emperor penguin population may be headed toward extinction.
Credit: Samuel Blanc
Climate change may be poised to claim its first Hollywood celebrities. Shrinking sea ice could wipe out the tuxedoed cast of March of the Penguins--or their descendents--by the end of the century, researchers report online today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Other emperor penguins that live farther south may fare better.
Emperor penguins--the world's largest at over a meter tall--are completely dependent on sea ice. They breed on it, and they eat fish that ultimately rely on the plankton that grows under it. As the globe warms, sea ice cover is declining in the Arctic; that's why polar bears, which hunt from the ice, are in trouble. The picture in Antarctica is less clear.
To gauge the impact on emperor penguins, ecologist Stéphanie Jenouvrier of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts focused on a population in Pointe Géologie, Antarctica. The penguins there spend the winter on ice close to Dumont d'Urville, the main French base in Antarctica, and records on them stretch back to the 1960s. They're also notable as the stars of the 2005 documentary, March of the Penguins.
Jenouvrier and her colleagues used the long-term data set to create a model describing the birds' life histories. They plugged in figures such as the age of the penguins when they start breeding and how likely the chicks are to survive. These details can reveal a more accurate picture of how a population will respond to a change in the environment. The team then linked this model to another set of models predicting how often the penguins will experience a major drop in sea ice as the climate changes between now and 2100.
Given the increasing frequency of 10% to 15% dips in sea ice forecast over the next century by the climate models the team used, Jenouvrier and colleagues predict that the number of Pointe Géologie penguins will plummet from 3000 to 400 breeding pairs. Finding a new home isn't an option, says Jenouvrier, because the penguins have to stick to the coast--and in that part of the continent, it's solid land to the south.
"Their conclusions for the Pointe Géologie colony are reasonable, in fact, optimistic considering the state of our present world," says penguin expert Gerald Kooyman of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego, California. Still, penguin lovers shouldn't despair just yet. Kooyman notes that many of the 400,000 or so emperor penguins in Antarctica live farther south, where it's colder and sea ice may behave differently. "Are emperor penguins as a species in trouble?" he asks. "I don't think so."
And sea ice geophysicist Stephen Ackley of the University of Texas, San Antonio, says that even the Pointe Géologie penguins may be okay, as he doesn't think the climate models are accurate enough to predict what sea ice will do. According to the models, "we should have already seen a decline of sea ice in the 1990s," he says. Instead, "we're seeing an increase. ... I have to be skeptical about how well they can predict the future."
Finally, some scepticism of climate models is being reported, although not by the author of the following link. Either ScienceNOW Daily News is trying to maintain some credibility on climate reporting, or Helen Fields didn't get the message.
Demographic models and IPCC climate projections predict the decline of an emperor penguin population
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Mmmm, penguin. I’ll bet you’d get some HUGE buffalo wings of those suckers.
Women, minorities, and penguins hardest hit.
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Since the ice is expanding down south, move the polar bears to Antarctica, get them out of the Canadians hair. The penguins will be in better shape because they’ll have something to run away from.
There, change you can believe in.
Of course, we’ll have to re-name Antarctica . . .
That’s fine. They’ll “evolve” again. Meanwhile, I look forward to sunbathing on those Arctic beaches. ;-) If any of y’all get too hot, come to the mountains.
As for the “carbon credits” rackets, we conservatives should be able to do some real work and out-build the greedy greenies. For example, there are very effective solar heat designs that can be built really cheap.
Let’s beat them at their game. Tax them more for divorcing and emitting twice the “carbon” that we emit with their two houses, two cars, etc. Tax them more for running dirty engines in their aging “clean” cars, as they struggle to pay them off. We can simply swap for new engines in our older vehicles once in a while and run cleaner. Tax vegetarians for their extra flatulence. Tax the drug abusers more for their associated mental health problems. Tax welfare queens more for their extra health problems and flatulence. Tax anti-property-rights homeowners’ association busybodies more for their extra contributions “carbon emissions” and oral flatulence. The list of possibilities goes on and on.
Fight fire with fire, and eventually, they’ll get off our cases. Flood congressional/assembly meetings with more testimony.
and the polar bears would eat all the penguins
Penguins should be outfitted with specially designed firearms then. ...or rodeo gear.
Go for it! It is a more intelligent idea than what comes out of climate change alarmism and Washington DC. We need some sense of humor in the present global cooling.
I don’t appreciate ice hockey anyway.
“Women, minorities, and penguins hardest hit.”
Who’s to say that if things had been different, we could have pet Tyrannosaurus Rexessesss?
At least ALGORE is trying to bring back the glaciers (no more mowing the grass!)
Meanwhile, the ice levels at the South Pole are slightly about the 1979-2000 mean. http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/daily.html
“There are many methods for predicting the future. For example, you can read horoscopes, tea leaves, tarot cards, or crystal balls. Collectively, these methods are known as “nutty methods.” Or you can put well-researched facts into sophisticated computer models, more commonly referred to as “a complete waste of time.”
Scott Adams
And Penquins are good for... What?
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