Jadwiszczak P. 2020. Outline Shape Analysis of Penguin Humeri: a Robust Approach to Taxonomic Classification
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Species Status Assessment Emperor Penguin (Aptenodytes Fosteri)
SPECIES STATUS ASSESSMENT EMPEROR PENGUIN (APTENODYTES FOSTERI) Emperor penguin chicks being socialized by male parents at Auster Rookery, 2008. Photo Credit: Gary Miller, Australian Antarctic Program. Version 1.0 December 2020 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Ecological Services Program Branch of Delisting and Foreign Species Falls Church, Virginia Acknowledgements: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Penguins are flightless birds that are highly adapted for the marine environment. The emperor penguin (Aptenodytes forsteri) is the tallest and heaviest of all living penguin species. Emperors are near the top of the Southern Ocean’s food chain and primarily consume Antarctic silverfish, Antarctic krill, and squid. They are excellent swimmers and can dive to great depths. The average life span of emperor penguin in the wild is 15 to 20 years. Emperor penguins currently breed at 61 colonies located around Antarctica, with the largest colonies in the Ross Sea and Weddell Sea. The total population size is estimated at approximately 270,000–280,000 breeding pairs or 625,000–650,000 total birds. Emperor penguin depends upon stable fast ice throughout their 8–9 month breeding season to complete the rearing of its single chick. They are the only warm-blooded Antarctic species that breeds during the austral winter and therefore uniquely adapted to its environment. Breeding colonies mainly occur on fast ice, close to the coast or closely offshore, and amongst closely packed grounded icebergs that prevent ice breaking out during the breeding season and provide shelter from the wind. Sea ice extent in the Southern Ocean has undergone considerable inter-annual variability over the last 40 years, although with much greater inter-annual variability in the five sectors than for the Southern Ocean as a whole. -
Longevity in Little Penguins Eudyptula Minor
71 LONGEVITY IN LITTLE PENGUINS EUDYPTULA MINOR PETER DANN1, MELANIE CARRON2, BETTY CHAMBERS2, LYNDA CHAMBERS2, TONY DORNOM2, AUSTIN MCLAUGHLIN2, BARB SHARP2, MARY ELLEN TALMAGE2, RON THODAY2 & SPENCER UNTHANK2 1 Research Group, Phillip Island Nature Park, PO Box 97, Cowes, Phillip Island, Victoria, 3922, Australia ([email protected]) 2 Penguin Study Group, PO Box 97, Cowes, Phillip Island, Victoria, 3922, Australia Received 17 June 2005, accepted 18 November 2005 Little Penguins Eudyptula minor live around the mainland and Four were females, two were males and one was of unknown sex offshore islands of southern Australia and New Zealand (Marchant (Table 1). The oldest of the birds was a male that was banded by the & Higgins 1990). They are the smallest penguin species extant, Penguin Study Group as a chick before fledging on Phillip Island breeding in burrows and coming ashore only after nightfall. Most on 2 January 1976 in a part of the colony known as “the Penguin of their mortality appears to result from processes occurring at sea Parade.” This bird was not recorded again after initial banding (Dann 1992). The average life expectancy of breeding adult birds until it was five years old and was found raising two chicks at the is approximately 6.5 years (Reilly & Cullen 1979, Dann & Cullen Penguin Parade. This individual had a bill depth measurement 12% 1990, Dann et al. 1995); however, some individuals in southeastern less than the mean for male penguins from Phillip Island (Arnould Australia have lived far in excess of the average life expectancy. et al. 2004), but was classified as a male based on the sex of its mates (sexed as females from the presence of cloacal distension Approximately 44 000 birds have been flipper-banded on Phillip following egg-laying or from their bill-depth measurements). -
A Global Population Assessment of the Chinstrap Penguin (Pygoscelis
www.nature.com/scientificreports OPEN A global population assessment of the Chinstrap penguin (Pygoscelis antarctica) Noah Strycker1*, Michael Wethington2, Alex Borowicz2, Steve Forrest2, Chandi Witharana3, Tom Hart4 & Heather J. Lynch2,5 Using satellite imagery, drone imagery, and ground counts, we have assembled the frst comprehensive global population assessment of Chinstrap penguins (Pygoscelis antarctica) at 3.42 (95th-percentile CI: [2.98, 4.00]) million breeding pairs across 375 extant colonies. Twenty-three previously known Chinstrap penguin colonies are found to be absent or extirpated. We identify fve new colonies, and 21 additional colonies previously unreported and likely missed by previous surveys. Limited or imprecise historical data prohibit our assessment of population change at 35% of all Chinstrap penguin colonies. Of colonies for which a comparison can be made to historical counts in the 1980s, 45% have probably or certainly declined and 18% have probably or certainly increased. Several large colonies in the South Sandwich Islands, where conditions apparently remain favorable for Chinstrap penguins, cannot be assessed against a historical benchmark. Our population assessment provides a detailed baseline for quantifying future changes in Chinstrap penguin abundance, sheds new light on the environmental drivers of Chinstrap penguin population dynamics in Antarctica, and contributes to ongoing monitoring and conservation eforts at a time of climate change and concerns over declining krill abundance in the Southern Ocean. Chinstrap penguins (Pygoscelis antarctica) are abundant in Antarctica, with past estimates ranging from 3–8 million breeding pairs, and are considered a species of “least concern” by BirdLife International1, but the popula- tion dynamics of this species are not well understood and several studies have highlighted signifcant declines at monitored sites2–6. -
Breeding Behavior of Captive Emperor Penguins (Aptenodytes Forsteri) : A
University of the Pacific Scholarly Commons University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations Graduate School 1983 Breeding behavior of captive emperor penguins (Aptenodytes forsteri) Mary Elizabeth Kiel University of the Pacific Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/uop_etds Part of the Biology Commons Recommended Citation Kiel, Mary Elizabeth. (1983). Breeding behavior of captive emperor penguins (Aptenodytes forsteri). University of the Pacific, Thesis. https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/uop_etds/465 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at Scholarly Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Scholarly Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. BREEDING BEHAVIOR OF CAPTIVE EMPEROR PENGUINS (APTENODYTES FORSTER!) A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School University of the Pacific In Partial Fulfillment of the Reguire$ents {or the Degree Master of Sci~nce .< r '. 't by Mary Elizabeth Kiel August 1983 This thesis, written and submitted by Mary Elizabeth Kiel is approved for recommendation to the Committee on Graduate Studies, University of the Pacific. Department Chairman or Dean : #AUM91{JJ Thesis Committee: ·11? ~~~:~------ __Ch_ai_rm_an Dated August 19 8 3 -------~---------------------------- Acknowledgements I would like to thank the staff of the Sea World Aviculture Department for their cooperation and assistance, particularly Scott Drieschman and Frank Twohey; Ann Bowles for working with me on vocalizations; Giuseppe di Sciara for translation of a monograph and for encouragement; Lee Christianson, Anne Funkhouser, Richard Tenaza, Dale McNeal, and Greg Sutcliffe for comments and discussion; and the members of the Biology Department of the University of the Pacific for their suggestions, encouragement, and patience. -
The Fish Component of Pygoscelis Penguin Diets by Nina J Karnovsky
The fish component of Pygoscelis penguin diets by Nina J Karnovsky A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Biological Sciences Montana State University © Copyright by Nina J Karnovsky (1997) Abstract: Long-term research on the breeding biology and foraging ecology of Antarctic seabirds has shown that these birds are excellent indicators of the environmental conditions of the Southern Ocean marine ecosystem. Since 1976 three species of penguins, the gentoo, Adelie and chinstrap, have been studied on King George Island, Antarctica. The coexistence of the three species during their breeding season could be a result of species-specific differences in prey, foraging habitat and/or feeding behavior. Previous studies have shown that krill is the major component of the diet of all three species. The importance of fish in their diet has been underestimated and not well understood. The objective of this study was to analyze which kinds of fish species, and to what extent, the different penguins rely on fish. I examined interspecific, intraspecific differences in the piscivorous portion of diet of the three penguin species. These data will be used for examinations of interannual variation in the penguin diets in the future. Changes in the percentage of, or a shift in species assemblages of fish eaten (preyswitching) could reflect variations in environmental conditions. Such a change might be expected because krill populations have declined in the past decade due to a decrease in winter sea ice. Krill depend on sea-ice for protection from predators and for feeding on the ice-algae populations. -
Sentinels of the Ocean the Science of the World’S Penguins
A scientific report from The Pew Charitable Trusts April 2015 Sentinels Of the Ocean The science of the world’s penguins Contents 1 Overview 1 Status of penguin populations 1 Penguin biology Species 3 22 The Southern Ocean 24 Threats to penguins Fisheries 24 Increasing forage fisheries 24 Bycatch 24 Mismatch 24 Climate change 25 Habitat degradation and changes in land use 25 Petroleum pollution 25 Guano harvest 26 Erosion and loss of native plants 26 Tourism 26 Predation 26 Invasive predators 26 Native predators 27 Disease and toxins 27 27 Protecting penguins Marine protected areas 27 Ecosystem-based management 29 Ocean zoning 29 Habitat protections on land 30 31 Conclusion 32 References This report was written for Pew by: Pablo García Borboroglu, Ph.D., president, Global Penguin Society P. Dee Boersma, Ph.D., director, Center for Penguins as Ocean Sentinels, University of Washington Caroline Cappello, Center for Penguins as Ocean Sentinels, University of Washington Pew’s environmental initiative Joshua S. Reichert, executive vice president Tom Wathen, vice president Environmental science division Becky Goldburg, Ph.D., director, environmental science Rachel Brittin, officer, communications Polita Glynn, director, Pew Marine Fellows Program Ben Shouse, senior associate Charlotte Hudson, director, Lenfest Ocean Program Anthony Rogers, senior associate Katie Matthews, Ph.D., manager Katy Sater, senior associate Angela Bednarek, Ph.D., manager Acknowledgments The authors wish to thank the many contributors to Penguins: Natural History and Conservation (University of Washington Press, 2013), upon whose scholarship this report is based. Used by permission of the University of Washington Press The environmental science team would like to thank Dee Boersma, Pablo “Popi” Borboroglu, and Caroline Cappello for sharing their knowledge of penguins by writing and preparing this report. -