Climate Change to Hit Emperor Penguin Population George Dvorsky - io9
go to original July 13, 2014

A new analysis shows that global warming will reduce Antarctica's emperor penguin population by nearly 20% over the next 80 years as the sea ice on which they breed becomes less secure.

For the most part, climate change is proving detrimental to the world's animals, though some certainly stand to benefit. Antarctica's iconic emperor penguin, it would now appear, does not appear to be one of them — despite the fact that climate change is bringing warmer temperatures to the frozen continent. The problem is loss of breeding habitat.

Today, many scientists believe we are on the cusp of a sixth mass extinction which could wipe out…Read more

The new study, which is the first to project the long-term outlook for emperor penguins, suggests that penguin populations will rise slightly until the 2050s, but then experience a decline of 20% by 2100; that would represent a loss of about 120,000 individuals. The report urged governments to list the birds as endangered.

Read the entire study at Nature Climate Change: "Projected continent-wide declines of the emperor penguin under climate change"

Image: BMJ/Shutterstock

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