Birds and wind farms/climate change

[Michael Szabo]

Marine life in Antarctica will bear the brunt of climate change impacts on the continent, a new report says.

The report - Antarctic Climate Change and the Environment - from the Scientific Committee of Antarctic Research has been presented to the 12 nations part of the Antarctic Treaty in Berlin, Germany.

It says the acidification of the ocean, changes to sea ice, ice shelf loss and the warming of the ocean's surface could see species, ecosystems and food webs change or go extinct.

This is largely down to impacts on krill, which penguins, seals, seabirds and whales - even humans - eat.

Changes in Antarctica and the Southern Ocean are linked to, and influence, climate impact drivers around the world.

One of the report's authors, Steven Chown, told Breakfast Antarctic protolife will essentially fall off the ends of the earth.

"Tropical species can move to where it's cooler, but species that really need the cold have got nowhere to go.

"So we're on this path, we've set out on this path, to change a world that is just fantastic for all of us, by losing all of these species."

Chown said species such as krill and plankton form the basis of the marine food web. Without them, "one's altering all of the iconic things we've come to know and appreciate".

"Albatrosses, penguins, seals and krill feeders will be substantially affected as a consequence."

The population of emperor penguins, which has already declined over the last 10 years, could fall close to extinction with "business-as-usual climate scenarios".

Chown said the message is to get emissions down - and quickly.

"There has to be real urgency of action. What's good for Antarctica is actually good for everywhere else."

But there could also be significant impacts on humans too, the report warns.

There are projections the melting of the continent's two ice sheets will contribute substantially to global mean sea level rise.

If it were to melt entirely, it would contribute around 58m in sea level rise.

It is projected global mean sea level rise will be 1.02m before 2100, although 1.6m and 2.3m has been bandied about depending on if greenhouse gas emissions are addressed.

Sea level rise approaching 2m by 2100 and up to 5m by 2150 under a very high greenhouse gas emissions scenario also exists.

By 2300, high emissions climate models predict up to 16m global mean sea level rise.

Antarctica itself is expected to contribute up to 0.03 to 0.34m to sea level rise by 2100.

With only 40cm of sea level rise, a once-in-a-century flood event turns into an annual event, Chown said.

"We're dramatically changing the way the world would work. There would be hundreds of millions of people that will be displaced as a consequence if we don't actually get on top of our emissions and reduce them rapidly."

Changes to the atmosphere, ocean and cryosphere were also noted.

The report contains a host of policy recommendations and warns immediate and deep emissions reductions are required.

"Effective action is now more urgent than it has ever been."

Link to news report: https://www.1news.co.nz/2022/05/25/anta ... BpXyLi9rwA

[Michael Szabo]

"The climate crisis is bringing extreme heat, changing ocean currents and intensifying storms – and it’s dealing a devastating blow to one of the most threatened groups of birds in the world.

Between 1950 and 2010, globally monitored seabird populations plummeted by 70%.

In the UK alone, nesting seabirds have declined by 30% since 2001. Seabirds are now counted as one of the most threatened groups of birds in the world.

Their numbers have been cut down by invasive species, overfishing, entanglements in fishing gear (bycatch), plastic pollution, oil spills and decades of habitat destruction.

But mass die-offs are adding to this already precarious situation. Experts have linked these deaths – which are separate to recent devastating outbreaks of bird flu – to bouts of hot weather, changing ocean currents and storms."

Link to article: https://www.theguardian.com/global-deve ... g-en-masse

[Michael Szabo]

Australian scientists observe ‘rapid’ decline in Adélie penguin numbers off Antarctic coast

Scientists at the Australian Antarctic Division have recorded a severe decline in a population of Adélie penguins off the east Antarctic coast.

Long-term monitoring has revealed a 43% drop over a decade in the number of birds that breed across 52 islands near the Mawson research station.

The scientists say the decline is a stark contrast to other Adélie penguin populations in east Antarctica where numbers have been stable or increasing.

It is also contrary to models that had predicted a continued increase in this particular population, as had occurred in previous decades.

To collect the data, seabird ecologists surveyed the islands along a 100km stretch of coastline every year from 2010 to 2020 to monitor breeding pairs.

They found the number of occupied nests fell from 176,622 to 99,946, which translates to a decline of about 77,000 nests or 154,000 breeding birds.

Dr Louise Emmerson, a seabird ecologist, said the sharp drop in numbers was similar to the declines seen in Adélie populations on the Antarctic peninsula, where the effects of fishing, climate change and other human activities have been most evident on the species.

The scientists believe it is a change in environmental conditions that has triggered the “rapid” decline of the Mawson population.

In research published in Global Change Biology, Emmerson and co-author Colin Southwell wrote that initial declines were likely caused by a period of extensive summer “fast ice” – which is ice that is attached to land but covers sea water – from 2004-05 to 2009-10.

They say this hampered access to foraging habitat resulting in virtually no chicks surviving in those years.

There has been an overall decline in fast ice in Antarctica, however scientists have noted there is regional variability, with declines detected in some areas and increases in others.

“Generally [the penguins] have to walk across the fast ice to open water to go foraging,” Emmerson said.

“Chicks are only 90 grams when they first hatch. They’re tiny things and at that stage they require frequent small meals.”

She said the extensive fast ice meant parents had to travel further for food and did not get back as quickly and frequently as their chicks needed.

Link to news report: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/ ... 8-BR-vp7LQ

Link to paper: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epd ... /gcb.16437

[Michael Szabo]

"When marine heatwaves began hitting NZ again in 2022, dead Kororā/Little Penguins began washing up on beaches in their hundreds. Their small bodies would lie part-buried in the sand of the Bay of Plenty – 183 one day, 109 another. The Department of Conservation concluded that the birds had died starving – as warm waters redistributed fish deeper and further, the penguins could not reach them."

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... -the-world

[Michael Szabo]

Oceans have been absorbing the world’s extra heat. But there’s a huge payback - The Guardian

Record sea surface temperatures suggest the Earth is headed for ‘uncharted territory’ in terms of sea level rise, coastal flooding and extreme weather

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... ge-payback

[Michael Szabo]

Global heating has likely made El Niños and La Niñas more ‘frequent and extreme’, new study shows - The Guardian

A new study by Australian and US scientists says that greenhouse gases have already affected climate patterns in the Pacific that could lead to more severe weather, floods and heatwaves

Global heating has likely intensified a climate pattern in the Pacific since the 1960s that has driven extreme droughts, floods and heatwaves around the globe, according to the new study.

The scientists said they had shown for the first time that greenhouse gas emissions were likely already making El Niños and La Niñas more severe.

The shifts in ocean temperatures and atmospheric conditions in the Pacific – known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation (Enso) – affect weather patterns around the globe, threatening food supplies, spreading disease and impacting societies and ecosystems.

Link: https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... nt-extreme

[Michael Szabo]

Thousands of emperor penguin chicks across four colonies in Antarctica died in a ‘catastrophic breeding failure’ in late 2022, according to new research published by the British Antarctic Survey:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... ice-levels

[Michael Szabo]

Emperor penguins suffered mass breeding failures in 2023 amid record low sea ice

LONDON, April 25 (Reuters) - Record low sea ice in late 2023 led to breeding failures in one-fifth of Antarctica's emperor penguin colonies, scientists with the British Antarctic Survey said on Thursday.

Emperors - the world's largest penguin species and one of only two endemic to Antarctica — depend on sea ice firmly attached to the shore to lay their eggs and raise their chicks. If ice breaks up too early, the chicks will be forced to enter the sea before their waterproof feathers have fully come in.

"They'll either freeze to death or they'll drown," said Peter Fretwell, a scientist with the British Antarctic Survey who studies wildlife using satellites.
That happened in 14 of Antarctica's 66 emperor penguin colonies last year as the extent of Antarctic's sea ice shrank to a record low, driven in part by climate change-fuelled heating. Tens of thousands of chicks are likely to have died.

The extent of spring and summer sea-ice around Antarctica has fallen significantly over the past seven years, with 2022 and 2023 registering record summer lows.

Although 2023 saw a lower sea ice extent than the year before in nearly all months of the breeding season, emperor penguin colonies experienced fewer breeding failures than in 2022, which saw breeding failures at a third of all colonies, Fretwell said.

That was partly because there were fewer sea ice break-up events in 2023, while some birds also seemed to adapt to the changed conditions.
"Maybe half a dozen or so of the colonies that were affected in 2022 took action and moved their breeding locations," said Fretwell, who surveyed the birds' movements and breeding failures via the Copernicus Programme's Sentinel-2 satellite.

Some moved south to better ice, while other colonies went up on to more stable ice shelves or large icebergs to try to avoid the worst conditions.
This, Fretwell said, was reassuring "because it just shows these birds will adapt to the changing conditions to a certain extent".

Still, scientists predict that 99% of emperor penguins will be lost by the end of this century if sea ice continues to decline due to climate change fuelled by the burning of fossil fuels.

Link: https://www.reuters.com/business/enviro ... 024-04-25/

[Michael Szabo]

More intense, frequent tropical cyclones may devastate seabird colonies – study

Up to 90% ‘lost in the blink of an eye’, say scientists studying Cyclone Ilsa’s effect on birds on Western Australian island

Increased tropical cyclones due to global heating could lead to dramatic declines in seabird populations, according to a new study.

Scientists found that after Cyclone Ilsa – a category-5 tropical cyclone – hit Bedout Island in Western Australia in April 2023, several seabird populations experienced a collapse of 80-90% due to the storm at the internationally important breeding site.

The study – published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment – found this level of loss could be unsustainable for seabird populations as the regularity and intensity of cyclones increase due to global heating, with the extreme winds, heavy rains and huge swells disrupting their breeding cycles.

Seabirds are crucial for maintaining tropical reefs, and the scientists warn that the loss of birds could put further pressure on ecosystems.

The study’s lead author, Dr Jennifer Lavers, a researcher at the Natural History Museum, said: “While Bedout may be one small island in a remote area of Australia, there’s so much we can learn from what happened here.

“More than 20,000 animals were lost in the blink of an eye,” she said. “Surveys of the island over three months make it clear recovery will be slow and likely interrupted by another cyclone event.”

Researchers used aerial and ground surveys to estimate the mortality of three species – the brown booby (Sula leucogaster), the lesser frigatebird (Fregata ariel), and an endemic subspecies of the masked booby (Sula dactylatra bedouti) – in the months after the storm.

At least 20,000 birds were lost on the 17-hectare (42-acre) Bedout Island, mostly breeding adults. The Bedout masked booby is found nowhere else. Lavers said the example of Bedout had broader implications for seabirds around the world.

While it is normal for tropical cyclones to have dramatic impacts on wildlife populations, including seabirds, they are projected to become more frequent and violent in a warming world, disrupting seabird populations’ ability to recover.

“The mortality that we’ve seen is unprecedented,” said Dr Alex Bond, the principal curator of birds at the Natural History Museum. “The cyclone hit in April, which is a reasonably peak time when lots of seabirds were nesting.

“We were able to do counts of the bodies and we estimated that basically all the brown boobies and practically all the masked boobies had been killed by Cyclone Ilsa.”

Winds of at least 135mph (217km/h) were recorded in the storm before it made landfall on Western Australia and Bedout Island.

Bond said: “The important thing to remember is that these birds have evolved in areas with cyclones. That’s not the issue here.

“The problem is twofold: number one was just the intensity of the storm. This was the strongest cyclone to hit Australia, and we’re going to see more of that as one of the consequences of the global climate breakdown. The other issue is the recovery time.”

Link: https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... tralia-aoe

[Michael Szabo]

BBC World Service reports that the Tahkuoluotu wind farm in Finland can shut down individual turbines if endangered seabirds fly too close:
https://www.facebook.com/Birdsnewzealan ... uzcWJeyQPl