Emperor penguins are the tallest and heaviest penguin species in the world and can be found swimming, playing, and raising their young in Antarctica. Unfortunately, new reports are showing that the emperor penguins' habitat is in a weakening state, and it's having a devastating effect on these birds.
What's happening?
Satellite images, collected between 2009-2024, examined by the British Antarctic Survey, show a decrease in emperor penguin colonies, as reported by The Conversation.
"They noted an average 22% fall in numbers across these colonies. That translates to a decrease of 1.6% every year," The Conversation stated.
The emperor penguin's decrease in colonies comes from habitat loss. With melting "fast ice" — or sea ice connected to the Antarctic coast, where young penguin chicks remain until they grow their adult, waterproof plumage, the babies are heading into the icy sea before they are ready.
Why are decreases in the penguin colonies important?
The effects of extreme weather events can be seen across the world and impact everyone. Rising temperatures in Antarctica, flooding in Nigeria, and droughts in Australia all indicate something is not quite right.
While natural disasters have always occurred, the excessive, destructive nature in which they continue to worsen can be attributed to the harmful, dirty fuels pumped into our air, affecting temperatures and throwing off the Earth's natural balance.
Not only do these disasters destroy crops and agriculture, affecting both food supply and affordability for humans, but by ruining animals' environments, they pose a great threat to the biodiversity of our planet.
"Each of these species and organisms work together in ecosystems, like an intricate web, to maintain balance and support life," World Wildlife Fund reports. "Biodiversity supports everything in nature that we need to survive: food, clean water, medicine, and shelter."
What's being done about the emperor penguin colonies?
Research into emperor penguin colony loss is still ongoing, as the satellite images and research only focused on a portion of the continent.
"The new research suggests the future of these iconic birds is not looking good," The Conversation said. "Until the world gets serious about cutting greenhouse gas emissions, sea ice will retreat — and more chicks will fall into the icy water before they are ready to launch."
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