113 Emperor Penguins at Halley Bay
Channel: Chris Marquardt
Date: 2020-11-24

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[Emperor penguins](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Emperor_penguin) are probably one of the most difficult animal species to reach, as they are [true Antarctic penguins](https://www.britannica.com/animal/emperor-penguin) that spend the [winter on the ice]((https://www.wwf.org.uk/learn/fascinating-facts/emperor-penguins)) around the southern continent to hatch their young. They [breed in large colonies](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Emperor_penguin), [the largest ones](https://medium.com/@charlotte.diamond/how-and-why-are-penguins-disappearing-aa69d523c060) being at [Coulman Island](https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-84074-6_17) in the Ross Sea and at [Halley Bay](bas.ac.uk/polar-operations/sites-and-facilities/facility/halley/) in the Weddell Sea. Over the past 60 years that researchers have been observing the Halley Bay colony, [between 14,300 and 23,000 pairs have flocked to the site’s sea ice](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/one-antarcticas-largest-emperor-penguin-colonies-has-suffered-three-years-catastrophic-breeding-failures-180972043/) to breed. But since 2016, [breeding failures have been “catastrophic”](https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-04/bas-bf042419.php) and the penguins appear to [have abandoned](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/science/emperor-penguins-antarctica.html) what was once a reliable haven.

In 2015 the strongest El Niño in decades began [disrupting Halley Bay’s “fast ice,”](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339273446_Significant_chick_loss_after_early_fast_ice_breakup_at_a_high-latitude_emperor_penguin_colony) that is anchored to the shore or ocean floor. Between April and December, the penguins depend on fast ice to provide stable ground for mating, incubating eggs and caring for chicks. But in 2016, the ice broke apart before the baby penguins would have developed the feathers they needed to swim. Thousands of them appear to have drowned. The ice failed to properly reform in 2017 and 2018, leading to the [death of almost all the chicks](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332653748_Emperors_on_thin_ice_Three_years_of_breeding_failure_at_Halley_Bay) at the site each season. And now, the colony at Halley Bay has largely disappeared. 

The [Brunt Ice Shelf]((https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Brunt_Ice_Shelf)) at the colonies' edge is traversed by a [crack](https://www.bas.ac.uk/project/brunt-ice-shelf-movement/). [Previously stable for about 35 years](https://mashable.com/article/brunt-ice-shelf-iceberg-explained/), this crack [recently started accelerating](https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/144563/countdown-to-calving-at-brunt-ice-shelf) northward last year as fast as [4 kilometers per year](https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2019/03/Brunt_ice_shelf_cracked).

Today [the large Chasm 1 crack](https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/03/huge-chunk-brunt-ice-break-off-antarctica/) is only [within a few kilometers]((https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-10-09/formation-of-brunt-ice-shelf-iceberg-in-antarctica-captured/11370748?nw=0) of the [McDonald Ice Rumples](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/McDonald_Ice_Rumples) and the [Halloween crack](https://www.universetoday.com/141570/antarctica-is-about-to-unleash-an-iceberg-twice-the-size-of-new-york-city/). If [the cracks merge](https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/13/545/2019/), the area of ice lost from the shelf will likely be at least 1700 square kilometers (660 square miles). 

Scientists have been [looking for new colonies](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2351989416301111) for the last 10 years. Through [satellite mapping technology](https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-53549299) they know have [located 11 previously unknown emperor penguin colonies](https://www.bas.ac.uk/media-post/scientists-discover-new-penguin-colonies-from-space/) based on [mapping the brown-red guano stains](https://zslpublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/rse2.176) the birds leave on the ice. So it's literally the [penguin poo seen by satellites that leads to the discovery of these previously unknown emperor colonies](https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/emperor-penguin-colonies-satellite-antarctica-guano-a9655051.html) in Antarctica. There are now known to be [61 emperor penguin colonies]((https://e360.yale.edu/digest/emperor-penguin-colony-experiences-catastrophic-breeding-failure)) scattered around the continent.

This is an episode of the Curiously Polar podcast

with
Chris Marquardt https://chrismarquardt.com/ 
Henry Páll Wulff: https://henrypall.com/

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