animalphiles

Rare white penguin sited in Antarctica

From ABC News:
The sighting of a rare penguin has excited researchers near Mawson Huts in Antarctica.

An adult, unpigmented Adelie penguin was photographed near Granholm Hut on Sunday.

Penguins lacking pigmentation are referred to as "leucistic" and don't usually survive until adulthood because they attract predators and don't breed.

Australian Antarctic Division biologist, Rhonda Pike, says only one penguin with the genetic defect has been detected over a number of breeding seasons in a population of 4,000 Adelies.

"We have a population of tagged birds out there and we've never tagged any of the leucistic birds," said Ms Pike.

"So we don't know if it's the same one coming back year after year, but yeah, one out of 4,000."
Photo: Mawsons Hut Foundation: Brett Jarrett

Warming endangers penguins

The penguin population of Antarctica is under pressure from global warming, according to a WWF report.

The report, Antarctic Penguins and Climate Change, shows that the four populations of penguins that breed on the Antarctic continent — Adélie, Emperor, Chinstrap and Gentoo — are under escalating pressure. For some, global warming is taking away precious ground on which penguins raise their young. For others, food has become increasingly scarce because of warming in conjunction with overfishing.

"The Antarctic penguins already have a long march behind them," says Anna Reynolds, Deputy Director of WWF’s Global Climate Change Programme. "Now it seems these icons of the Antarctic will have to face an extremely tough battle to adapt to the unprecedented rate of climate change."

The Antarctic Peninsula is warming five times faster than the average rate of global warming. The vast Southern Ocean has warmed all the way down to a depth of 3000m.

Sea ice — ice that forms from sea water — covers 40% less area than it did 26 years ago off the West Antarctic Peninsula. This decrease has led to reduced numbers of krill, the main source of food for chinstrap penguins. The number of Chinstraps decreased by as much as 30% to 66% in some colonies, as less food has made it more difficult for the young to survive. It's the same story for Gentoo penguins, who are increasingly dependent on the declining krill stocks as overfishing kills off their usual food sources.

The Emperor penguin, the largest and most majestic penguin in the world, has seen some of its colonies halved in size over the past half century. Warmer winter temperatures and stronger winds mean that the penguins have to raise their chicks on increasingly thinner sea ice. For many years, sea ice has broken off early and many eggs and chicks have been blown away before they were ready to survive on their own.

In the northwestern coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, where warming has been the most dramatic, populations of Adélie penguins have dropped by 65% over the past 25 years. Not only has food become scarcer with the disappearance of sea ice, but the Adélies’ warm-loving cousins, the Gentoos and Chinstraps, have also "invaded" the region.

Warmer temperatures mean that the atmosphere can hold more moisture, which in turn brings more snow. Scientists are worried for the Adélie penguin, which needs land that is free of snow and ice to raise their young, and is likely to lose out to its warm-loving cousins.

"The food web of Antarctica, and thus the survival of penguins and many other species, is bound up in the future of the sea ice," says Jame Leape, Director-General of WWF International.

"After such a long march to Bali, ministers must now commit to sharp reductions in carbon emissions for industrialized countries, to protect Antarctica and safeguard the health of the planet."

Crows show common sense

Don't call crows bird-brained. A new study suggests they may be more clever about using sticks than primates (which have bigger brains).

New Caledonian crows in Australia were observed reasoning through a way to use sticks to their advantage, rather than just relying on trial and error.

Researchers placed a meaty snack in a hole too deep for the crows to reach—to get it, they needed to fish it out with a long stick, as is a natural behavior for them. Yet the long stick was also placed out of reach, leaving the birds with only a small stick to grab with their beaks. The birds used the short stick to get the long tool out of a box - showing analogical reasoning.

Three of seven crows that were tested figured out the short-stick/snack puzzle on the first try without training, and all eventually learned the trick within 25 tries. Such a performance overshadows that of capuchin monkeys in a similar experiment reported in 2003 by other scientists, in which it took 50 tries for three-quarters of the monkeys to succeed.

New Marine Park Protects Half a Million Penguins

The Bronx Zoo-based Wildlife Conservation Society has announced that the government of Argentina will create a new marine park along its isolated and windswept Patagonia coast to safeguard more than half a million penguins and other rare seabirds.  Located in Golfo San Jorge, the new protected area covers around 250 square miles (647 square kilometers) of coastal waters and nearby islands strung along almost 100 miles (160 kilometers) of shoreline.

The announcement was made by President Nestor Kirchner of Argentina, the Governor of the Province of Chubut—Mario Das Neves—and by Argentina’s National Park Service. The park’s creation represents a joint effort by the Government of Chubut, the National Parks Service of Argentina, the Wildlife Conservation Society and the Fundación Patagonia Natural.

“This decision represents a significant commitment by the government to protect one of the most productive and extraordinary marine ecosystems on the planet,” said Dr. Guillermo Harris, director of the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Argentina Program. “The creation of this park comes in the nick of time for many species that are threatened by the region’s fisheries and energy industry.”

The new park serves as a nesting and feeding ground for some quarter million pairs of Magellanic penguin, estimated to represent 20 percent of the entire species. The park includes more than 40 small islands, which support the only two nesting colonies of southern giant petrels on the entire Patagonian coast, as well as the only colonies of Southern American fur seals. Other denizens of this coastal oasis include the endangered Olrog’s gull, the white-headed steamer duck, and almost a quarter of all imperial and rock cormorants of Argentina.

While the coastline is largely undeveloped, its wildlife is under pressure from a number of threats, including Argentina’s commercial shrimp industry. Many birds become entangled in fishing nets, and oil pollution from tankers transporting petroleum from southern Patagonia to Buenos Aires and from expanding offshore oil drilling operations is a looming possibility.

Legislation to formally create the protected area will be drafted in the next few months and approved by the Argentine Congress and local legislators. 

WCS has been active in Patagonia since the 1960s, conducting studies for the conservation of southern right whales, Magellanic penguins, southern elephant seals and other unique wildlife species. WCS also recently became the owner of Karukinka a protected area of over half a million acres in southern Chile on Tierra del Fuego – a gift of Goldman Sachs in 2004 – which contains some of the world’s last remaining wilderness areas at the southernmost tip of South America.

Monitoring birds from space

Researchers from the Wildlife Conservation Society have succeeded in placing satellite collars on wild parrots for the first time ever, allowing the scientists to track the birds across the wild landscape of Guatemala with earth-orbiting spacecraft.

In conjunction with the Loro Parque Foundation, Texas A&M University, Amigos de los Aves-USA, North Star Science and Technology, and the US Agency for International Development, researchers with the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Guatemala Program recently succeeded in fitting two adult scarlet macaws with satellite tracking (Platform Terminal Transmitter, PTT) collars in an effort to learn more about the habitat use and migration patterns of the birds. Two macaws were captured in the La Corona region of the Maya Biosphere Reserve of Guatemala,  and released on the 27th of June and the 4th of July, respectively.

“We know where these birds nest, but we have no idea where they go and how they use the surrounding landscape for the rest of the year,” said WCS-affiliated researcher Dr. Robin Bjork. “The collars will enable us to track these wide-ranging birds and help inform management strategies to protect the species in Guatemala.”

The researchers are already receiving data from the collars, with positions obtained by satellite and sent to the field station computers.  The collars are expected to last for 9 months, which should generate the data needed to illuminate the mysterious nonbreeding season habitat use, and habitat requirements of the scarlet macaw in Guatemala.

WCS researchers are hopeful that they will be able to capture the collared birds during the 2008 nesting season to remove the collars.  If recapture is not possible, the collars have “rustable” nuts that increase likelihood the devices will decay and eventually fall off.

The scarlet macaw is a denizen of the humid, riparian forests of Latin America, ranging from Mexico down to the Peruvian and Brazilian Amazon. The primary threats to the species are habitat destruction and the pet trade. The scarlet macaw is currently listed on Appendix I of CITIES (Convention on the International Trade of Endangered Species). In Guatemala, some 300 individuals persist in the Maya Biosphere Reserve, a stronghold for the population.

The Wildlife Conservation Society recently announced that it will invest $3 million over the next five years to the Maya Biosphere Reserve, important for not only scarlet macaws but other wildlife as well as important archeological sites. The funding is aimed at creating a conservation network called the “Mesa Multisectorial Para el Area Natural y Cultural de El Mirador-Rio Azul,” which will span more than 3,800 square miles—an area larger than Yellowstone National Park—as well as provide funding for El Mirador-Rio Azul National Park.

Fuzzy babies at Central Park Zoo

On the big screen, penguins are everywhere. Whether they are marching, surfing, singing, or dancing, most people can't get enough of these well-dressed and waddling birds. And for those people, the Wildlife Conservation Society's Central Park Zoo has a very special treat: penguin chicks! These adorable fuzzy creatures might be tough to see at first, but patient Zoo-goers will see their furry, little heads popping up from their nests over the next few weeks.

The Central Park Zoo has successfully hatched penguin chicks for 15 out of the last 17 years. While bringing the next generation into the world may be a less perilous process for their penguins than it is for the Emperor penguins depicted in the film March of the Penguins, it still requires meticulous care and dedication. Getting penguins to breed at the Zoo is a year-long process that starts with getting them in the mood via lighting and that doesn't mean lighting a few candles.

Zookeepers simulate the Antarctic light cycle so the birds can adhere to a breeding schedule similar to the one they would have in the wild. This careful lighting cues the birds to the time of year in the Southern Hemisphere and when they should start thinking about building their nests. At that point (typically early spring), zookeepers introduce rocks, similar to ones found in the birds' native habitat, into the exhibit. The male penguins then present rocks to their mates during the breeding season. While this may bring to mind a certain human courtship custom, these penguins use their rocks for more practical purposes - nest building.

The Central Park Zoo has two different kinds of Antarctic penguins, Gentoos and Chinstraps. Gentoos measure up to 18 inches and the chinstraps stand up to 12 inches. The males and females of both species take turns sitting on nests and feeding their young. Once the babies grow old enough to waddle away from their nests,  zookeepers bring both the chicks and their parents to their dry summer homese behind the exhibit to keep them safe and warm-- the chicks' downy feathers need to stay dry until their adult when their waterproof feathers grow in. Once the youngsters are swim-ready, the entire family returns to their waterfront property.

Once-common birds suffer major decline

Today's backyards look very different than 40 years ago - because once common birds aren't as plentiful.
A new analysis shows the populations of 20 common birds, including meadowlarks, pintail ducks and bobwhites are half what they were in the 1980s.

The National Audubon Society blames suburban sprawl, climate change and other invasive species. Many of the species listed as declining in the new study depend on open grassy habitats that are disappearing.

Some of the birds, such as the evening grosbeak, used to be so plentiful that people would complain about how they crowded bird-feeders and finished off 50-pound sacks of sunflower seeds in just a couple days. But the colorful and gregarious grosbeak's numbers have plummeted 78%.

Affected species include the northern pintail, greater scaup, boreal chickadee, common tern, loggerhead shrike, field sparrow, grasshopper sparrow, snow bunting, black-throated sparrow, lark sparrow, common grackle, American bittern, horned lark, little blue heron and ruffed grouse.

The northern bobwhite had the biggest drop among common birds. In 1967, there were 31 million of this distinctive plump bird. Now they number closer to 5.5 million.

While these common birds are in decline, others are taking their place or even elbowing them aside. The wild turkey, once in deep trouble, is growing at a rate of 14 percent a year. The double-crested cormorant, pushed nearly to extinction by DDT, is growing at a rate of 8 percent a year and populations of the pesky Canada goose increase by 7 percent yearly. The Eurasian collared-dove, which first entered Florida in the 1980s, it now is the most prevalent bird in the Sunshine State and is in more than 30 states.

 

Bird extinctions could come quickly

A new study estimates at least 400 species of birds could become endangered within the next 50 years because of global warming , deforestation and the conversion of grassland to crop fields.

“We found in our study that under certain assumptions by the year 2100, 950 to 1,800 bird species may be imperiled or even driven to extinction by climate change and habitat destruction,” said lead author Walter Jetz of the University of California, Davis. “Most of these species are currently not recognized as imperiled.”

Climate change will be the primary driver of extinctions at higher latitudes, as suitable habitats begin to shrink, the authors state.

For tropical birds, direct habitat destruction will be more of a problem: birds in tropical climates tend to be highly specialized to small habitat ranges. As soon as their home is gone, they have nowhere to go.

The projections from the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment are detailed in the online journal PLoS Biology.
photo:stock/xchng

Golden eagle chick is first born in decades in Ireland

A wild Golden Eagle chick has hatched in Ireland's County Donegal, for the first time in almost 100 years.

The exact location of the nest has not been revealed to the public in order to minimise disturbance to the birds. 

The parents were collected as chicks from the Highlands of Scotland. The pair was first spotted together on 1 August 2006 and have been together since.

Golden eagles became extinct in Ireland in 1912. Adults were reintroduced into Glenveagh National Park  in 2001, and despite eggs being laid in 2005 and 2006, this is the first year young have been produced.

The nest actually hatched two chicks, but as normally happens, the second chick died after five days. According to the Golden Eagle Trust, there will be a further wait of seven to eight weeks to see if the remaining chick can continue to grow and hopefully fledge in late July.

The Minister for the Environment, Dick Roche, has welcomed the news that a chick has hatched, describing it as 'a marvellous milestone'.

Gay flamingos adopt chick

Headlines just don't get any better. Two male flamingos who have been partners for six years have become parents, "adopting" a chick at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust in Britain.

Carlos and Fernando had a history of chasing other flamingos off their nests in order to steal the eggs. WWT spokeswoman Jane Waghorn says,  "They were rather good at sitting on eggs and hatching them so last week, when a nest was abandoned, it seemed like a good idea to make them surrogate parents."

When the egg was first abandoned, WWT officials whisked it off to an incubator where it hatched within hours. Staffers were concerned the Carlos and Fernando would not bond with the newborn because the process normally begins when the chicks are "calling" them from inside the egg.

So the chick was carefully placed in an old eggshell, which was taped up and returned to the unsuspecting couple's empty nest. The pair were soon seen 'talking' to the chick inside the egg and a little while later it hatched for a second time - to be greeted by its loving new foster parents.

Waghorn says Gay flamingos are not uncommon. "If there aren't enough females or they don't hit it off with them, they will pair off with other males." Males can produce a type of milk in their throat to feed chicks.