One of 1.5 million Ad茅lie penguins Rachael Herman, Stony Brook University / Louisiana State University
TWO huge colonies of Ad茅lie penguins have been discovered hiding in plain sight on Antarctic islands.
Ad茅lie penguins () were known to nest on the Danger Islands, near the tip of the west Antarctic Peninsula. But only in 2014 did satellite images reveal large areas stained with guano.
A team led by of Stony Brook University in New York has now surveyed the birds, using drones specially adapted for the cold.
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The Ad茅lie penguin colony on Heroina Island in the Danger Islands, Antarctica Thomas Sayre-McCord / WHOI / MIT
They found 1.5 million Ad茅lie penguins, taking the total number in the world to 8 million (). There were also smaller colonies of and penguins.
The global population of Ad茅lie penguins was already increasing, for unknown reasons. However, numbers have fallen around the west Antarctic Peninsula, which has warmed rapidly in recent decades because of climate change. An east Antarctic colony, on Petrel Island, has suffered two bad breeding seasons in the last decade.
This article appeared in print under the headline “Secret penguins revealed by drones”
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