The reason we go to Beaufort is that it appears to be the true “penguin pump” in this cluster of colonies in the southern Ross Sea. We want to confirm this. The colony at Cape Crozier produces lots of chicks, like Beaufort, but it has a huge area for expansion, if the penguins are up to that. Mostly they are not, because more and more penguins in one area leads to more competition for food in nearby waters. To avoid that, young Crozier penguins might want to find a territory elsewhere, or not, like at Cape Bird.

The Beaufort colony also regularly produces a lot of chicks, but until recently there was no room for the young prebreeders that result from that to find a spot, except in very poor habitat (see below). That’s why young Crozier birds didn’t want to move there either. The Beaufort breeding area has been hemmed in by vertical cliffs behind, and open ocean the other way. Penguins would be everywhere where they possibly could be, wall-to-wall so to speak. Penguins that didn’t want to tussle for a spot definitely would show up elsewhere like Cape Royds: lots of space there and no competition for food. We know this because we’ve been making the icebreaker trips almost every year since 1996 in order to band a bunch of chicks at Beaufort. In later years, we see these banded birds at Beaufort but in disproportionate numbers we see them at the other colonies, too…until recently.

Beaufort, 2001.

Here’s a shot of Beaufort from the air taken in 2001; west is towards the background. You can see the ‘shelf’ of gravel on which the colony nestles, hemmed in by precipitous cliffs in the back, snow fields to the west, and the ocean. Penguins are everywhere that there is level ground and no ice (there are about 60,000 nests crammed into this area). The west end of the colony is hemmed in by ice fields (see next photo).

Yes, disproportionate numbers of penguins raised at Beaufort have been going elsewhere until a few years ago when global climate change began to kick in around here. Then, with slightly warmer temperatures the snow and ice fields on Beaufort began to rapidly retreat [sound familiar? Hey, I drove up to see Glacier National Park this past summer to see the glaciers before they are gone….maybe by 2015 they say.] This warming caused the ice to retreat at Beaufort also, thus exposing lots of terrain with lots of small pebbles, ideal for nests.

A new breeding area at Beaufort.

Here is a picture of penguins setting up territories at the west periphery of the colony that until recently, 2001 (see aerial Beaufort photo) was covered (probably for the last 20,000 years) by snow and ice. These penguins were not here in 2001. So, you see, that bad-ee, Global Climate Change, can be “good” sometimes!

Well, there are so many penguins trying to find a nest at Beaufort, and so little space and not enough rocks, that, actually, Global Climate Change is not happening fast enough!! As a result, many penguins are nesting in suboptimal habitat and more than likely they will lose their nests and its eggs. This will force them to be more prudent next season. Either they will set up nests at the west end of Beaufort (see photo above)…the most likely….or many will seek out places like Cape Royds, where lots of stones are to be had along with lots of space (and usually open water; see next blog dispatch).

With stones in short supply, some penguins turn to nesting in guano (penguin poop).

These penguins are nesting in scoops in the guano with almost no stones. All of the stones have been used up by other penguins! More than likely their eggs will roll out of the nest and, in fact, on our next visit following this one, we found eggs EVERYWHERE.

With an insufficient number of rocks holding a nest together, penguins’ eggs roll out and are lost.

There are well over 30 whole eggs in this picture that have rolled out of nests. There simply were not enough rocks for the penguins to build the protective “basket” to hold them.

Still lots of nests had eggs but lots had rolled away– so many that the skuas had too many to eat! The other thing that happens when a penguin has a scoop but no stones, is that it fills up with water. That’s bad for eggs and chicks.

Penguins with drowned nests.

Here are penguins who built nests, and laid eggs, in a depression that initially was dry but now is filled with melt water. There was no room for them on high ground. Yes, there are eggs underneath these birds!! This is a demonstration of how staunch penguins are, in spite of adversity. They won’t give up until the conditions become impossible. These are impossible conditions, and yes, these penguins gave up!

Ill-fated nests.

Here are a bunch of penguins that have built their nests on a nice sandy beach (above). How idyllic! It’s the kind of place that people would hang out; all we need are some palm trees. However, when all that ice in the background eventually melts later in the summer, then the sea is going to come pouring in, waves crashing, to wash the penguins’ feet, but also their eggs and chicks, too. These penguins, too, next season will be looking elsewhere for making a nest!

So you see, and I know you’ve been told this before, Nature works in strange ways. It takes some adversity to convince penguins, and people, to alter their behavior…that is, to stay in higher or safer ground!!!! This is going to be the same for people beginning very soon, as global climate change REALLY gets going. I hear that insurance companies no longer are insuring houses on the US Gulf Coast, owing to increasing numbers of hurricanes and rising sea level. See, if the insurance companies can’t afford this, neither can the rest of us. Where are all those Floridians going to be living? In Georgia, I guess. Penguin Insurance Companies, to stay in business, would not insure these penguins’ homes shown above. (Penguins don’t get government bailouts for bad decisions.)

Carbon dioxide is a colorless, odorless gas that makes up .04 percent of the earth’s atmosphere. It’s released by the breakdown of organic materials, by animals when they respire, and by the burning of fossil fuels. Carbon dioxide isn’t toxic—after all, we exhale it with every breath and use it to make our drinks fizzy. However, carbon dioxide is considered a pollutant because, as a greenhouse (heat-trapping) gas, it’s a significant contributor to global warming.

Factory pollution is but one of the ways industrial society has contributed to climate change.

In the last 150 years, carbon dioxide from factories, power plants, and fuel-burning vehicles has boosted natural levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Data from ice cores taken in Antarctica show that carbon dioxide in our atmosphere has increased 36 percent from preindustrial levels. Carbon dioxide raises global temperature by trapping heat that would otherwise escape directly into space.

Continually climbing levels of carbon dioxide are of special concern at the poles for two reasons. First, polar regions are especially sensitive to global warming. Already, temperature increases measured at the poles are twice those measured at the equator. (See Climate Change.) Also, warming temperatures in the Arctic may release even more carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases such as methane, by melting frozen soil called permafrost. (See Tundra and Permafrost.) In this way, thawing at the poles may result in a positive feedback loop, in which thawing causes faster warming, in turn causing more thawing.

The Atmospheric Research Observatory at the South Pole is part of a world-wide campaign by NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) to collect long-term measurements on compounds in the atmosphere. In addition to this South Pole station, NOAA maintains climate observatories in Samoa, Mauna Loa, Hawaii, and Barrow, Alaska.

Predicting the outcome of effects such as thawing of permafrost requires a thorough understanding of the carbon cycle, a collection of processes whereby carbon (in various forms) shifts between the atmosphere, the ocean, the land, and living things. The carbon cycle is complex, however, and not yet fully understood in a warming world.

To keep track of carbon dioxide and study global warming, scientists use gas detectors to continually monitor global atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. Measurements must be made far from sources that might skew the reading, so the monitoring stations are located in remote locations, including the South Pole and Barrow, Alaska. In time, these measurements may help scientists better understand the carbon cycle and predict future climate change.

An Antarctic iceberg on the solstice.

Maria Vernet is a marine scientist from Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego who studies plankton off the Antarctic Peninsula of West Antarctica. As one of the project leaders for the Palmer Long Term Ecological Research project, Maria has participated in many of the project’s 14 yearly research cruises.

Maria at the helm of a zodiac (small rubber boat.)

The Antarctic Peninsula, experiencing some of the most dramatic warming anywhere on the globe, is also among earth’s most productive marine ecosystems. During winter 2008, Maria studied the ecology of phytoplankton (microscopic plants) and its role within the marine ecosystem at the Palmer Station Long-Term Ecological Research Network (LTER).

The LTER network includes 26 sites mostly in the US, and includes ecosystems from the poles to the tropics. Scientists study the areas from many angles, combining their research to give a broad view of how ecosystems work.

These carvings were found buried with Thule remains.

Anne Jensen at the Nuvuk archaeological site with the Exploratorium’s Robyn Higdon.

One of the largest questions in northern archaeology concerns the Thule people, ancestors to modern Iñupiaq people. How did the Thule people come to be in Alaska? Why did they spread rapidly to Greenland and Canada? Anne Jensen and Laura Thomas are part of a project that’s helping to answer these questions. They’re also working to save ancient remains from washing into the sea at the historic settlement of Nuvuk. Global warming is melting the sea ice, exposing more open water with waves that hit the coast for longer periods of time, especially in the fall. At the same time, storms and storm surges are fiercer. The result is an increase in erosion, which is causing more skeletal human remains to surface.

Laura Thomas at the Nuvuk dig site.

People abandoned Nuvuk in the 1940s. Most of it has already been lost to the ocean, but waves and ocean storms are uncovering graves, some 1,000 years old or older. Under the direction of Jensen and Thomas, local students have been working each summer to save their ancestors from an unwanted reburial at sea. With the encouragement of the Iñupiaq Elders, scientific studies are carried out before reburial at a protected site. These studies may help in understanding Thule origins and their adaptations to climate change.

The Nuvuk Archaeological Project crew excavating.