Study: Global warming could bring penguins to brink of extinction
If global temperatures continue to rise, however, the Emperor penguins inTerre Adélie, in East Antarctica may eventually disappear, according to a new study by led by researchers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Complete bullshit. Temperatures in East Antarctica have cooled, and sea ice has steadily increased. Much of the claimed 0.6C global warming has been winter temperatures at high northern latitudes. How is that supposed to affect Penguins in Antarctica?
Global warming may have another victim in its sights: the penguin.
According to newly released report, penguins are facing an intangible threat that may ultimately decimate the population.
A study produced by several Boulder researchers notes that penguin populations could decline by as much as 60 percent. The team noted that a series of recent observations showed that the penguin population is already witnessing a steep decline in numbers.
Hopefully the money for phony Boulder scientists will drop by 100%.
“Over the last century, we have already observed the disappearance of the Dion Islets penguin colony, close to the West Antarctic Peninsula,” says Stephanie Jenouvrier, WHOI biologist and lead author of the study. “In 1948 and the 1970s, scientists recorded more than 150 breeding pairs there.”
She notes that within the past ten years the population has nearly vanished, a disturbing sign that global warming may be forcing the birds to migrate elsewhere.
Exactly. The birds moved their colony elsewhere. One study of one small local population tells nothing about the overall population of the species.
“By 1999, the population was down to just 20 pairs, and in 2009, it had vanished entirely,” said Ms. Jenouvrier.
Study: Global warming could bring penguins to brink of extinction | The Bunsen Burner
Reminds me of Fen Montaigne’s Article in the New Yorker – “The Ice Retreat” (21 December 2009), which was the very moving story about penguin expert Bill Fraser and the disappearance of an Adelie penguin colony on Litchfield Island on the Antractic Peninsula. It attributes the disappearance of the colony to global warming caused by the industrial nations.
The article notes that the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has concluded that human-induced global warming “began to clearly impact the planet” in about 1974 when Fraser first visited Litchfield Island. At that time the rookery had nine hundred breeding pairs of Adelie penguins. Paleoecological studies have indicated that the “penguins have nested on Litchfield Island since at least the sixteenth century,” now the breeding Adelie penguins have all but disappeared from the one third square mile sized island.
However, the article fails to note that, as reported in the International Polar Year (IPY) studies of the region, the paleoecological record also indicates that the presence of ancient, abandoned nest sites suggests that up to 15,000 pairs may have annually used the colony at one time. It therefore appears that over 90% of the decline occurred prior to the advent of so-called human-induced global warming. Surely this is a material fact and should have been mentioned in the article.
“…current General Circulation Models (GCM) do not, however, simulate the observed warming in this area over the past 50 years [King, 2003] and until the past warming can be properly simulated, there is little basis for prediction that rapid warming will continue in future. This in turn limits our ability to predict the future biological and physical impacts.”
http://www.antarctica.ac.uk/bas_research/science/climate/antarctic_peninsula.php
Translation: We can’t explain the warming in this area using climate models, but we’re guessing global warming must be to blame anyway.
Management Plan for
Antarctic Specially Protected Area No. 107
EMPEROR ISLAND, DION ISLANDS, MARGUERITE BAY, ANTARCTIC
PENINSULA
Page 9..
150 breeding pairs is 300 birds. But acording to Poncet 1982, only 70-80 adults and 20 chicks were counted in 1978.
Lying by omission this b!54 is. The fact of the matter is, the Dion Island colony has always been marginal and isolated from other colonies. An increase of a poofteenth of a degree in temps make no difference that can be ascertained even by rent seeking activist fraudsters.
Let’s not forget that the researchers themselves are affecting the populations http://news.discovery.com/animals/penguins-bands-research-110113.html .
I was going to point out this very fact DERise!! thanks!
It’s seems there is this mad rush of all the thieves trying to get on the gravy train all at once. We will ,I think , see a cold winter this year and likely the final nail in the AGW coffin so they must get that money this summer while we are getting hit with the dead cat bounce of the dying gasps of the warm cycle we have been in. I’ve really enjoyed this warming spell for these twenty or so years what with the productivity of the farms and all and am not looking forward with joy to the coming cold cycle. Guess I’ll have to try ice skating and other winter sports I’ve not participated in since the fifties and sixties.
If only, if only …
But I’m willing to bet that the AGW-show still has a further 3-5 year run. These people aren’t just vying for places on the gravy train (although that is certainly part of it); they believe in this completely, they’ve bought the whole enchilada.
If the people weren’t knowledgable about solar eclipses, they would be telling the population our environmental “sins” were causing the sun to disappear. People’s ignorance and superstitution has always been used to herd and rob the population. It’s the very reason they steer people away from counter-evidence by demeaning anyone who would disagree with them. I just read that Exxon and Koch was giving Heartland 10’s of millions, so nobody should pay any attention to what they have to say. They know this is a lie because they had access to Hearlland’s stolen donor list, where Koch gave 25K to education and I know of no mention of any Exxon donations.
“Stephanie Jenouvrier, WHOI”, which is pronounced “HOOOO-EEEEEE”
‘Tis the same sound uttered downwind of the feedlot and other vast piles of BEE-ESS.
Incidentally, if bird populations are anything like small mammal populations, then subpopulations may be crashing all the time. Survival in the wild is always a touch-and-go proposition, and animals at a given location may often suddenly disappear, either by death or migration.
I wonder if Ms. Jenouvrier thinks of a penguin colony in Western Antarctica as a kind of avian suburbia …
When asked to identify her hero, Stephanie admitted to not having one, but confessed to being fascinated “by the adventures of people engaged in causes they believe in.”
http://www.myhero.com/go/hero.asp?hero=Stephanie_Jenouvrier_06
Another ‘scientist’ with a ’cause’?
Now the Polar Bear scam is running out of steam (hot air?) the scammers are looking for a replacement. Penguins are so far away that there’s probably less information available to conflict with their claims.