Antarctic penguin colony vanishes, warming to blame?

[joeybee12]

A small colony of emperor penguins on an island off the West Antarctic Peninsula is gone, and the most likely culprit is loss of sea ice caused by warming. Although it has been predicted that penguins could suffer greatly because of global warming, this is the first time the disappearance of a colony has been documented.

The researchers, however, caution that their study is hampered by a lack of long-term information on emperor penguins, both at this site and in general, and their environment.

Emperor penguins are regal, if bulky, birds that stand as high as 4 feet (1.2 meters) and can weigh as much as 84 pounds (38 kilograms). This colony, first spotted in 1948 on an island dubbed Emperor Island, was a small one that had approximately 150 breeding pairs.

Observations are spotty, but the populations appear to have been relatively stable until the 1970s. A report in 1978 showed a sharp drop in population, a trend that continued until an airplane survey found the island empty in 2009. This raises the question: Did the penguins die off or just relocate? "That's one of the big unknowns," said Philip Trathan, the lead researcher and head of conservation biology at the British Antarctic Survey.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41953114/ns/us_news-environment/

[Zoeisright]

1. Global warming certainly is a prime culprit.

We're going to be seeing much more of this in the years ahead, deniers notwithstanding.

[joeybee12]

2. You gotta wonder what it's gonna take to make the deniers stop

denying...maybe extinction of the human race might finally do it.