Of what I speak is a seabird colony existing where the marine ecosystem has not been subject to wide-scale pollution from agricultural and civic runoff, fish depletion, introductions of alien species, harmful plankton blooms (“red tides”) and lots of other things that currently ravage most marine ecosystems of the “civilized” world. I speak of the Ross Sea, the last ocean on Earth where seabirds are capable of being too successful in their breeding. Hmmmm, yes, you heard me right. That is a statement that should give you pause for contemplation, and refers to a concept foreign to most marine ecologists. And what could I possibly mean by this? How can a colony of seabirds ever be too successful?

If you’ve been following my previous dispatches to Ice Stories for this recent Antarctic summer, one was called “Royds Tranquility” and another was “Beaufort Chaos”. In those I reported on the contrast between the Royds penguin colony (one “city” in this story, 2000 penguin pairs) and the more populous colony at Beaufort Island, the other city (60,000 pairs). The Royds colony was very quiet but at the time miserably failing owing to the 70 km walks that most parents were making to find the ocean and food…and 70 km back. The extent of fast ice was very unusual owing to very calm winds last winter and spring. Other than birds attempting to remain resolute on their nests, no others were present. Deserted eggs were everywhere, as more and more adult penguins giving up and going off to feed, their mates choosing not to return.

At Beaufort Island, where the ocean was at the penguins’ doorstep, just a short skip away, penguins were coming and going in multitudes, and because many nested in suboptimal habitat– being forced to do so because the good spaces had all been taken– some were losing their eggs too. But there were huge numbers of eggs still under other parents, being warmly incubated. In addition, due to a short journey from wintering areas just before nesting, all colonies, Royds included, began the season with their respective breeding populations at maximum, i.e. above normal. “Everybody”, it seems, attempted to nest! [If you’ve not read the earlier dispatches, perhaps do so before proceeding further in this one.]

About 40 km to the east of Beaufort, the colony at Cape Crozier was in a similar state to Beaufort: maximum proportion of a large colony, twice the size of even Beaufort (150,000 pairs), attempting to breed. Well, we could not follow up at Beaufort (couldn’t get there at the end of the season) but did have the opportunity in regard to Crozier. I think the stories for both Beaufort and Crozier were pretty much the same, although, being smaller, likely Beaufort didn’t have quite the problem experienced at Crozier.

At all our penguin colonies, there are the “super breeders” who almost always produce young– despite conditions– and then there are the “other” penguins. Mainly the super breeders have learned, through experience, about the vagaries of factors that penguins need to know about. This involves just 25% of the population, or thereabouts; the remainder of penguins almost always fail unless conditions are really easy. This season, the super breeders came front and center at Royds. Not only did they successfully hatch their eggs (unlike the klutzes) but also raised the maximum of two chicks. Therefore, even though 75% of nests failed, the total average chick production of the colony was 0.6 chicks per nest, which isn’t all that bad, given that in good years, an average 0.9 chicks are produced among all nests in which eggs are laid.

What these super breeders had figured out was that they could feed through narrow cracks in the ice and not walk all the way to the open ocean. Then, the ice opened into a polynya [patch of open water in the ice] off Royds, as I described in the “Minke Friends” dispatch. From then on, foraging was easy and the Royds chicks ballooned to become heavier than even last season, averaging around 3800 grams by the time they were 6-7 weeks old and within a week or so of fledging. That’s BIG for an Adélie penguin chick! As is the usual, the Royds chicks didn’t form crèches [groups of penguin chicks] because almost all the time, at least one parent was present to protect them.

Below are two images of Royds, taken on 17 January 2009, showing all the adults present. The reason that there are an equal number or more chicks than adults is because most chicks had a sibling…so two chicks for every successful nest.

Chicks and adults at Royds.

Penguin adults and chicks at Cape Royds, Antarctica.

So now, what about the other penguin city, the one at Crozier (standing in for Beaufort in this tale)? At Crozier, not only did a maximum number of birds attempt to breed, but almost all successfully hatched their eggs. This was because initially finding food was easy, as long as a parent only had its own mouth to feed. Not long after peak hatching, though, the parents began to make longer and longer foraging trips as they depleted food nearby. Of course these seabirds had help from whales and fish in this consumption, unlike the case for any other place in the World Ocean.

Chicks at first did ok, but once they reached the age of maximum growth rate, around 3 weeks of age, troubles began for Crozier. Eventually, parents’ trips reached three days long and less food was returned as some was digested on the trip back (these penguins hold the food in their stomachs, and then regurgitate it to their chicks — see previous dispatch — and once that cold wad begins to heat up in the parents’ stomach, it begins to digest, a common occurrence when the trip back to the colony is more than a day long). Well, basically the chicks at Crozier, though reaching appropriate size (height) for their age, became way under weight. At week 7 they were more than 1 kilogram (1000 g) lighter than Royds birds, and their feather development was halted. In fact, average weight was lower than we’d ever measured it at Crozier. Many chicks began to die of starvation. There were just way too many of them to be fed with the result that almost all were under-fed. In fact, breeding “success” at Crozier was 1.0 chicks crèched per original nest (it’s usually no better than 0.9). Wow! That’s a lot of chicks when you consider there were 150,000 nests to begin with.

Looking to the immediate future, it would seem that the chances for eventual survival of the Crozier chicks is close to zero, quite in contrast to the fat, vigorous but many fewer chicks at Royds. The Royds chicks should have a great chance for survival.

Below are images from Cape Crozier taken on 20 January. The contrast with Royds is dramatic, as almost no adults are present, even though the chicks are just a few days older than those shown in the images above from Royds. Sad.

Cape Crozier chicks with few adults in sight.

Cape Crozier chicks with few adults in sight.

Here you can see lots of chick carcasses. These chicks, unfortunately, have died of starvation. Also sad.

Crozier chicks and carcasses.

So, this is all pretty amazing, but we had to go through the entire season to see how things played out, and flip-flopped Royds vs Crozier. In the last several seasons (2001-2005), we witnessed somewhat similar events at Crozier, but chalked it up to effects of the big icebergs that were present then. The icebergs occupied a large portion of the Crozier colony’s foraging area.

Those icebergs have been gone now for two seasons. So, we have to consider other ideas to explain what is going on now. Perhaps, it seems, Cape Crozier has grown too large!! This rarely could happen to a seabird colony elsewhere in the world. Mostly this is so, because the population is kept low by pollution, toxic die-offs, invasions of feral animals or other type events; or breeding success is low owing to difficulty in finding food early in the season (over-fishing). In some warmer-water colonies of seabirds, where the environment allows the population to be present year round, a portion of large populations may just hang out in waters nearby and not participate in breeding. That doesn’t seem to be an option for migratory seabirds nor for seabirds that live in extreme environments, in both cases like is the case for Adélie penguins.

Well, ok, it was a very “educational” season for us, as are many. To complete our education, though, we have to be present in 4-5 seasons hence to tally the winners and losers among the penguin cities. That’s because young Adélie penguins spend their first years at sea and don’t visit the colonies.

For this season we are done, and here is what our camp at Cape Royds now will look like through the winter darkness. (See dispatch, “So, You Want to Be a Penguin Researcher?” for a view of the camp all set up.) In a couple of months you’ll need a flashlight to see this, our camp in a small box….well, a slightly large one.

Our camp.

Well, there is the usual sort of thing, like learning as much as possible in school about science and math, getting a good understanding about how the universe works, including the process of evolution. Then, it’s good, but not necessarily necessary, that you go to graduate school to rub elbows with people who have done research.

Anyone can be a scientist, really. In fact, ‘science’ is basically just a way of looking at things. In science, when you see some pattern out there in nature, or in a test tube, or through a telescope or a microscope, you formulate a preliminary explanation of what you see (which is called a hypothesis). Then, you try to be clever to find ways to DISPROVE your idea. If your explanation can withstand your testing, then you’re probably onto something.

On the other hand, if you are not a person thinking in a scientific way, then you just have an idea about something that strikes you as cool, and maybe you write a poem about it or paint a picture, or just continue to think it to be cool. Truly, there are ways of seeing things that are valid even if you are not being scientific. I’m not talking here about religion, or about morals, these two not necessarily being the same thing. I’m a scientist but I am also religious: I feel the vast and great forces of Nature all around me, and I’m awed and feel insignificant.

For a scientist, the cool part of it, besides the phenomenon itself, is coming up with an explanation that withstands concrete, observable alternate explanations. Then you see if someone else has had those thoughts (by reading stuff), and if not, you write a scientific paper about it and submit it for publication. This is the sort of thing you’d learn about in graduate school, mostly the process of being a scientist, that is, a person who finds stuff out and is responsible enough to tell other people through a publication.

Thomas Jefferson was a person who was not a ‘scientist’ but he was a great practitioner of ‘science’ and was very knowledgeable about nature, especially botany. He once said, in regard to his charge, Meriwether Lewis (the guy he sent to explore the Missouri and Columbia rivers before other white guys did), that “observation unrecorded is knowledge lost”. That’s so, so very true!!! In the olden days, people ‘recorded’ their observations and knowledge by intricate and constant story telling. Now we write things down, take notes, etc., and write papers and essays.

In any case, enough of this book learning side to being a penguin researcher. Let’s see, what did I do yesterday in this process of learning facts about penguins? Yesterday, and the day before and the day before that, we were engulfed in a major storm, winds up to 60 knots (though higher away from the shelter of where our platform tent is located) and from time to time snow so thick one couldn’t see more than a few yards. Well, Roald Amundsen, polar explorer extraordinaire, once said, “If you’ve had an adventure then you haven’t prepared!”

True, but sometimes there are ’small’ things that don’t go exactly as planned. And you have to deal with them before they become big things. This I was thinking, yesterday, upon hearing a thud and a clank outside, at the same time that our heating stove died. Seems we had a gust of wind from an unanticipated direction, which then took advantage of the fact that the propane in one of our canisters had been used up. Thus the canister was about 150lbs lighter than when I hoisted it in place.

Shoot, why now? Definitely not fair! So, I donned all my polar clothes… looking like the Dough-man… got a wrench, and out I went. I proceeded to wrestle with the two remaining, full canisters, which had blown over, too, upon the other becoming too light (these winds ARE strong). This isn’t so easy to do in a hurricane, wearing gloves and a parka hood that wouldn’t sit straight on my head. Thus I was usually seeing out with just one eye. Try untying and then re-tying knots wearing gloves in those conditions! Ultimately, though, I succeeded, made sure all the ropes on various tents and things were snug, and then back inside I went. Heating stove started right up!

That was the highlight of yesterday. Today, with lessening though still blustery winds I ventured down to the penguins. The penguins could care less, of course, what with this weather. The tent, though, which protected the computer that goes with our automatic weighing scale, was in need of help. Thought I’d gotten it right the first time, when setting it up! But the wind had torn some of the sewed-in loops out. So, it was kind of the same story, tying and un-tying knots in very strong winds, with tent flaps flapping etc etc etc, wind trying to take them one way, and me trying to force them the other. I sure am glad that my Dad and others taught me a lot of neat knots. They don’t teach that stuff in science graduate school! Finally, I got the whole thing staked down again in all its important parts. Then, after an hour or two, I went off to see how the penguins were doing. Taking notes as I went, of course, me being a scientist.

These are the kinds of things one has to do to have a successful season of field research. It’s a lot of camping and ‘surviving’ in order to be collecting data and taking notes, and thinking scientific thoughts. So, if you want to be a penguin researcher, do a lot of camping before hand, just to become comfortable with those little ‘adventures’ that arise day to day. Of course, some penguins live in places where the comforts of civilization aren’t all that far away. But I like camping out there in Nature, with my religion all about.

Part of our field camp.

Above is our lodging for this 2008-09 penguin research season. It’s called a RacTent (the blue and yellow structure). You can see the propane canisters in the back to the right, where the anemometer (wind gauge) is located (that pipe sticking up). To the left are the solar panels. Those have to be rotated now and again to keep them facing the sun, especially when there are lots of clouds and not much reflectance off the snow.

Inside the RacTent.

Above is the inside of the RacTent. In the far right corner is the propane camp stove, underneath which are about 5 boxes for recycling, one box for a different kind of stuff: food waste, cans, mixed paper, and non-recyclable stuff (plastic and cellophane food wrappers, etc). To the right is the propane heating stove. Anything put on the floor is liable to freeze, including your feet. Walking around, though, the upper half of your body is comfortably warm. To the left, you can see my ‘desk’ and laptop. Note the telephone on the card-table. That’s a wireless connection to McMurdo Station. The other morning at 5:30AM, the McMurdo Fire House called saying that someone from this number had called in a 911 code. Must have been some penguins fiddling with the antenna, or some electrons that the wind had overly excited.

The computer tent, with Adélies.

Here’s the tent containing the computer, with the automatic scale to its left. Solar panels that run the computer and scale are to the right of the tent. The wind is very, very clever about un-raveling things, wanting everything to enter a state of chaos. So, one has to keep paying attention to the small things, so they don’t become big and chaotic.

The green, plastic fence surrounding the penguins directs them to go and come by walking across the scale.

During the first few weeks, we had to drive out to Cape Royds from McMurdo on snowmobiles every few days. This was because the folks at McMurdo were way backed up in being able to install solar power at our camp. Thus, we couldn’t set up a permanent camp. It’s a 35 km trip from McMurdo, taking about 40 minutes. We had to drive out in order to look for banded penguins, whether they laid eggs, and to change the batteries in the time-lapse cameras. Here we are on one of the trips; for safety two snowmobiles were required…we took along people from McMurdo so that they could get a chance to see Antarctica:

It is a 40 min drive from McMurdo Station to Cape Royds on snow machines. Here we take a break to watch the plume on Mt Erebus, the only active volcano in Antarctica.

The reason the penguins arrived early, is that with a lack of wind during the winter (that’s true, it wasn’t very windy), the large-scale extent of sea ice in this portion of the Southern Ocean was much less than usual. The penguins winter at the pack ice edge, so with the edge much closer to Ross Island, they had a much shorter, maybe 1000 km less, trip to make.

The situation with the ice patterns involves the wind rather than temperatures. The temperatures are cold, regardless. When the winds blow off the continent in the winter the ice is blown farther and farther northward (away from the continent) leaving open water at the coast which allows more ice to be formed, which then gets blown north and the cycle goes on continuously (in most winters-springs). It’s like a conveyor belt. Winters with continuous winds, which is the usual, create pack ice a long way from the land sometimes as far as 2000 km. This last winter the winds were not strong or persistent and not as much ice was blown away from the continent. Thus, the penguins were not very far away when the sun rose and they began their southward journey. Not having as much distance to cover during spring migration, they arrived earlier than usual.

Once the first penguins arrived, the ‘flood’ began. Throughout the following few weeks, birds continued to come ashore, build their nests, find their mates and on Nov 5th we saw the first egg.

The first egg of the 2008-09 Adélie Penguin breeding season at Cape Royds, a bit early this year Nov 5.

Here’s a graph of penguin counts from the PenguinCam, comparing this year with last (the spaces between counts were days when it was too windy or snowy to get a clear image…many more of these windy days in 2007):

Arrival of Adélie Penguins at Cape Royds, based on photos from the Penguin Cam.

The window of successful laying at Cape Royds is short. If the eggs are not laid by about now (24 Nov), it is unlikely that parents can be successful. That’s because the winter comes early! A major factor that will contribute to the success rate of this year’s colony is the distance the birds will have to walk to find open water and food. After the female lays her eggs, she leaves the male in charge of the nest and returns to the sea to forage. This year, because of the lack of wind, a very extensive continuous sheet of ‘fast ice’ was able to form. Normally, wind would have blown new ice away, but the wind didn’t happen, so the ice sat in place and got so thick that whatever the strength of the later wind, it was not strong enough to budge the ice. It was locked fast in place by various points of land (kind of like a jig-saw puzzle). Now it is a long way from Cape Royds to the ocean and food, 70 km. This means two days of just walking, one way. Many females may decide not to return to relieve their mates, or will return a few days too late. The males will not sacrifice themselves for the sake of the egg, the drive to satisfy their growing hunger outweighing the inclination to raise progeny, and if the females do not return they will abandon the eggs. Only time will give us the answer to this one, but it is likely that the ice will remain in place until January, when the icebreaker arrives.

Here is an image taken by a NASA satellite a few days ago. It shows where Royds is located, and where the edge of the fast ice occurs (out by Beaufort Island). So, the penguins at Royds have to add 4 days to a foraging trip, 2 for walking out and 2 for walking back. Added to that are the days needed to catch food and replace fat reserves, i.e. several days. Four days of walking is a long time when you are hungry.

Satellite image of ice conditions in the Ross Sea area.