Birds and wind farms/climate change

[Neil Fitzgerald]

Albatrosses, some of the world’s most loyally monogamous creatures, are “divorcing” more often – and researchers say global heating may be to blame.

In a new Royal Society study, researchers say climate change and warming waters are pushing black-browed albatross break-up rates higher.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/24/climate-crisis-pushes-albatross-divorce-rates-higher-study

[Michael Szabo]

One in six Australian birds are now threatened, landmark action plan finds
Once-in-a-decade study finds 216 out of 1,299 species are in danger – up from 195 in 2011
Lisa Cox, The Guardian, 1 December 2021

One in six Australian birds are now threatened, according to a once-in-a-decade study that finds the climate emergency is pushing species closer to extinction.

The action plan for birds is a major scientific study led by Stephen Garnett of Charles Darwin University, with input from more than 300 bird experts.

It finds 216 out of 1,299 species are threatened – up from 195 in 2011 – with the climate crisis pushing more birds on to the list or increasing the threat status of those in danger.

Among them are 17 birds found in cooler, high-elevation rainforests in Queensland that either appear on the list for the first time or are now more threatened than they were a decade ago.

They include Fernwren, a little brown bird with a loud voice, whose numbers have declined by 57% since 2000, pushing the species from near-threatened status to endangered.

Others are the Golden Bowerbird, which is now considered near-threatened, and the Victoria’s Riflebird, which appears on the list for the first time as vulnerable species.

Sean Dooley, of BirdLife Australia, said it was estimated there were 6 million fewer individuals across those 17 species than there were in 2011 and “that is almost unequivocally due to climate change”.

“What really stands out from the action plan is how quickly climate change is impacting our birds,” he said.

In New South Wales, eight birds were found to have become more threatened as a result of the 2019-20 bushfires, including the Rufous Scrub-bird and the south-eastern Glossy Black-Cockatoo.

Sean Dooley, of BirdLife Australia, said it was estimated there were 6 million fewer individuals across those 17 species than there were in 2011 and “that is almost unequivocally due to climate change”.

Link to story: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... 7mRRbHITK8

[Michael Szabo]

It’s 70 degrees warmer than normal in eastern Antarctica. Scientists are flabbergasted.

The coldest location on the planet has experienced an episode of warm weather this week unlike any ever observed, with temperatures over the eastern Antarctic ice sheet soaring 50 to 90 degrees above normal. The warmth has smashed records and shocked scientists.

“This event is completely unprecedented and upended our expectations about the Antarctic climate system,” said Jonathan Wille, a researcher studying polar meteorology at Université Grenoble Alpes in France. ...

Instead of temperatures being between minus 50 and minus 60 degrees Fahrenheit, they’ve been closer to zero or 10 degrees Fahrenheit, which is considered to be a heat wave by Antarctic standards."

Link to Washington Post news report:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/ ... 7ZSuSGdIfQ

[Michael Szabo]

The emperor penguin is at severe risk of extinction in the next 30 to 40 years as a result of climate change, according to research by the Argentine Antarctic Institute (IAA).

The emperor, the world's largest penguin and one of only two penguin species endemic to Antarctica, gives birth during the Antarctic winter and requires solid sea ice from April through to December to nest fledgling chicks.

If the sea freezes later or melts prematurely, the emperor family cannot complete its reproductive cycle.

"If the water reaches the newborn penguins, which are not ready to swim and do not have waterproof plumage, they die of the cold and drown," said biologist Marcela Libertelli, who has studied 15,000 penguins across two colonies in Antarctica at the IAA.

This has happened at the Halley Bay colony in the Weddell Sea, the second-largest Emperor penguin colony, where for three years all the chicks died.

Every August, in the middle of the southern hemisphere winter, Dr Libertelli and other scientists at Argentina's Marambio Base in Antarctica travel 65 km each day by motorbike in temperatures as low as -40 degrees Celsius to reach the nearest Emperor penguin colony.

Once there, they count, weigh, and measure the chicks, gather geographical coordinates, and take blood samples. They also conduct aerial analysis.

The scientists' findings point to a grim future for the species if climate change is not mitigated.

"[Climate] projections suggest that the colonies that are located between latitudes 60 and 70 degrees [south] will disappear in the next few decades; that is, in the next 30, 40 years," Dr Libertelli said.

The emperor's unique features include the longest reproductive cycle among penguins.

After a chick is born, one parent continues carrying it between its legs for warmth until it develops its final plumage.

"The disappearance of any species is a tragedy for the planet. Whether small or large, plant or animal - it doesn't matter. It's a loss for biodiversity," Dr Libertelli said.

The emperor penguin's disappearance could have a dramatic impact throughout Antarctica, an extreme environment where food chains have fewer members and fewer links, Dr Libertelli said.

In early April, the World Meteorological Organization warned of "increasingly extreme temperatures coupled with unusual rainfall and ice melting in Antarctica" - a "worrying trend", said Dr Libertelli, with Antarctic ice sheets depleting since at least 1999.

The rise of tourism and fishing in Antarctica have also put the emperor's future at risk by affecting krill, one of the main sources of food for penguins and other species.

"Tourist boats often have various negative effects on Antarctica, as do the fisheries," Dr Libertelli said.

"It is important that there is greater control and that we think about the future."

- Reuters

Link: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/466689 ... ZIKtReXd9w

[Michael Szabo]

What NZ's lost moa is teaching us about climate change - Jamie Moreton, NZ Herald

New Zealand's long-lost moa can offer useful insights into how today's species might respond to a fast-changing climate, scientists say.

In a just-published study, Otago University researchers simultaneously analysed millions of pieces of DNA from moa fossils, to explore how moa changed their distribution as the climate heated and cooled.

They found that during the last ice age 25,000 years ago, the eastern moa – a sub-species once spread across the eastern and southern South Island - retreated to the south, leading to lower genetic diversity than other species who inhabited more areas.

The heavy-footed moa, meanwhile, headed to both southern and northern regions of the South Island, while the upland moa inhabited four different areas.

Lead author Dr Alex Verry said the species was spread across the eastern and southern South Island during the warmer Holocene period, but was restricted to the southern South Island during the height of the last Ice Age about 25,000 years ago.

This is in comparison to the heavy-footed moa, which retreated to both southern and northern regions of the South Island, while the upland moa inhabited four different areas.

"The eastern moa's response had consequences for its population size and genetic diversity – the last Ice Age lead to a pronounced genetic bottleneck which meant it ended up with lower genetic diversity than other moa living in the same areas," Verry said.

The new study marked the first time that high-throughput DNA sequencing, which simultaneously sequences millions of pieces of DNA, has been used to investigate moa at the population level.

The findings highlighted how past climate change impacted species in different ways and that a "one size fits all" model was not practical.

"It makes us wonder what is going to happen to species as they attempt to adapt to climate change today and into the future?" Verry said.

"It showed that we had all of these individualistic responses to climate change – and that you can't put everything in the same basket.

"So, in terms of future species, we're actually going to need conservation management tailed to individual species – and ensuring that they have habitat available so that they can respond."

Evidence gathered from sediment and ice suggests it's been about 10,000 years since the average annual temperature was as high as it is today - and temperatures we're now feeling are therefore likely to be near the top of the range that current ecosystems have experienced.

That's already limiting where our species can live.

Early signs include two weta species moving to higher elevations on Mt Taranaki, while native birds have retreated into cooler parts of their former habitats because there are more predators like possums, rats, and stoats in warmer lowland forests.

As the area of cooler forests shrinks, that pressure from predators will increase further - especially on large birds like kiwi, whio and North Island kokako that can't easily move.

Rawlence said the study also demonstrated how fossil remains and museum collections could be used to answer new questions about the past.

"This is really bringing the power of palaeogenomics to New Zealand research questions, whereas previously most research and interest has focused on Eurasian or American species.

"We are really starting to build capacity for this research in New Zealand."

"Will they also attempt to move to new areas in order to survive? For some species this will not be possible, some species will run out of space, such as alpine species which will have to move upward but can only go so far until there is no more 'up'."

Co-author Dr Nic Rawlence, director of Otago's Palaeogenetics Laboratory, said the research was a rare example of the impacts of past climate change on extinct megafauna from New Zealand.

[Jan]

Nic Rawlence gave a long talk with Kathryn Ryan on radionz.co.nz the other day. Or maybe Kim Hill? Anyway it will still be available to listen to on the website.

[Jan]

It was on Saturday Morning last sat. with Kim Hill. On the website it is picked out for that episode. I found the talk really fascinating.

[Michael Szabo]

40 dead blue penguins washed up on Far North Beach - RNZ, 24/5/22

Climate change is being blamed for more than 40 little blue penguins/ kororā washing up dead over a week at a Far North Beach.

Local resident Carol Parker found the lifeless bodies of the kororā on Tokerau Beach in Doubtless Bay on 8 May.

But a day earlier on a different beach, she had spotted a kororā, weak and alone on the sand.

She scooped it up and took it home, and went in search of some advice on how to help him back to life.

"I rang some vets to find out how to feed it and what how we could keep it alive.

"It wasn't injured... It looked very exhausted.

"The vet suggested we keep it warm, and that little slivers of raw fish dipped in a little bit of water. And that would just maybe help to save its life."

But the small baby penguin could not be saved.

"The very next day we were on Tokerau beach where there were 22 penguins that were on the beach expired.

"Some of them looked like they just landed just the night before or within the last 12 to 24 hours.

"They looked quite fresh. There was one or two other birds also that were dead."

Parker has lived in the area for 21 years.

About five years ago she found 10 dead penguins but said she had never seen anything in numbers that high.

What she didn't know, is earlier that week, on 2 May, the Department of Conservation had reports of another group of more than 20 dead penguins wash up on the same beach.

So why is it happening?

Department of Conservation's Graeme Taylor said it was mostly to do with the temperature of the water .

After the first finding of dead kororā, seven were sent for testing.

Results showed signs of starvation and hypothermia - no blubber to keep them warm in the water.

"They prefer to find their food in cold water.

"But when you have got La Nina conditions like we've had this summer with the constant northeasterly winds coming in from the subtropics you'll get the sea temperatures raised above normal, and the food supply for the penguins diminishes with those warm conditions."

He said the majority of the birds washing up would be babies that haven't got the strength to search deeper down into the water - or the endurance to keep going.

"Normally a penguin of this type is around about a kilo, but a lot of these really starving birds are down around half that weight, you know, 500 - 600 grams.

"They're just skin and bones.

"They've got no fat on their body which they need, they're in the water the whole time.

"So they need that insulation of the fat layer to keep them warm. And they haven't got that they haven't got much muscle tissue on them."

Mass deaths happen usually about once a decade, and Taylor said with over 40 gone in just one week from a single beach, this could be one of those years.

"The worry that we've got is that as global sea temperatures rise with the warming effect that we get from carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is that these events are going to become more frequent.

"And as a result, there's probably going to end up pushing the penguins out of the far north, the temperatures up there will not be able to be tolerated in terms of food supplies"

The Department of Conservation said the little blues are the warning sign of the impacts to come from climate change.

Link to RNZ report: https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programm ... orth-beach

[BerndHuss]

How sad! This makes me want to cry, but as long as most of the world turns a blind eye on matters of climate change, there is nothing that can improve that situation. Most of the governments of the world look at scientists like they are idiots. It surely looks bleak...

[Michael Szabo]

I've also seen reports of more Little Penguins being found dead recently on 90 Mile Beach and Mimiwhangata beach.
It seems there may be a mortality event unfolding so it is going to be important to record and report numbers elsewhere via beach patrols and eBird.