Climate change cited as Antarctic penguin population collapses

https://news.yahoo.com/warming-climate-cited-antarctic-penguin-044221045.html

CBS News•January 20, 2020

"CBS This Morning" sent correspondent Roxana Saberi to find out how climate change is threatening penguins for our series, "Eye on Earth." Our team visited a place rarely seen by human eyes, but impacted dramatically by human behavior.

Elephant Island, Antarctica — A new U.S. government report found the last decade was the hottest ever recorded on Earth, and 2019 was the second hottest year ever measured. The data has raised new concerns, and one of the places most seriously affected is Antarctica, at the bottom of the planet.

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The researchers are traveling on Greenpeace ships from island to island across the Antarctic Peninsula, comparing different penguin populations to see how the animals are adapting to climate change. While it looks frigid, it is one of the fastest warming areas on Earth.

One nearby island, actually called Penguin Island, has seen its chinstrap population plunge by nearly 75% over the past four decades. The numbers have dropped across the region as average temperatures have soared by more than 5 degrees Fahrenheit (3° Celsius) over 50 years. That increase is about five times the global average.

"When we see climate change impacting things down here, glacial melt, warming oceans, more acidic oceans," says Borowicz. "Penguins do really interact with all of those things."

So do krill, the chinstraps' favorite food. The tiny creatures also depend on sea ice to survive.

"Sea ice is really what brings all of the ocean life here together," Borowicz says. If there is less sea ice, there's less krill, which means less food for the chinstrap penguins.

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After days counting chinstraps on Elephant Island, the scientists invited Saberi and her crew onto their ship to watch them crunch numbers from one nesting site.

"They've lost already 50% since the early (20)teens," says the researcher compiling the data on a computer screen. "That's amazing."

That fits the pattern they're seeing on the island so far: a decline of around 150,000 chinstraps since the last major survey 50 years ago. Another sign, the researchers say, that this penguin population is collapsing across the region.

"It's very dramatic to have a wildlife population decline by 50% — an unexploited wildlife population. They're not hunted," says activist and researcher Steve Forrest. "I think climate change is driving almost all of the processes down here now in a way they've never experienced before."

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