Can penguins be used as bio-indicators of climate change?
Can penguins be used as bio-indicators of climate change?
mongabay.com
April 4, 2007
Scientists at the University of Birmingham are working to determine whether the king penguin can be used as a bio-indicator for global warming.
“If penguins are travelling further or diving deeper for food, that tells us something about the availability of particular fish in regions of the Antarctic. We may be able to assess the pressure exerted by king penguins on this ecosystem, and look at the effects of both climate change and overfishing in this region of the world”, said Dr Lewis Halsey of the The University of Birmingham who presented his research at the Society for Experimental Biology’s Annual Meeting in Glasgow.
Measuring the energy requirements of animals is one way to use them as bio-indicators said Halsey, who along with colleagues, “measured the heart rate and energy expenditure of king penguins” during various activities to see “if there was a correlation between the energetic costs of foraging at sea and the levels of fish available to the penguins i.e. did penguins have to work harder when food was scarce.”
 King penguin. Photo by Lewis Halsey |
“King penguins are good candidates as bio-indicators for several reasons,” explained a statement from the Society for Experimental Biology. “Firstly, while at sea foraging, they cover hundreds of kilometres and are able to dive to depths of several hundred metres, so they explore a relatively large portion of the expansive Southern Oceans. Secondly, the diets of several populations of king penguins are well known. Thirdly, while foraging for food is done at sea the penguins also come ashore to breed and moult, making them accessible to researchers.”
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This article is based on a news release from the Society for Experimental Biology