Kaiserpinguine (Aptenodytes forsteri) sind hart im Nehmen: Monatelang harren die Männchen in absoluter Dunkelheit bei bis zu minus 60 Grad Celsius ohne Nahrung im antarktischen Winter aus, um ihre Jungen auszubrüten. Die Weibchen streifen währenddessen teilweise weit vom Nistplatz entfernte Mir, um Nahrung für die Kühe zu jagen. Wo die Kolonien der Tiere liegen, ist zum Teil noch gar nicht bekannt, doch lassen sich die Vögel verräterische Spuren auf dem Eis, die Satelliten aufspüren können. Auf diese Weise entdeckte ein Team um Peter Fretwell vom British Antarctic Survey (BAS) ein bis dato unbekanntes Brutgebiet der Kaiserpinguine, berichtete die Arbeitsgruppe im Rahmen des Projekts »Wildlife from Space«.
Fretwell and Co compared recordings of the Sentinel 2 mission with highly resolved pictures of the Maxar Worldview3 satellite. This enabled you to confirm what had already indicated in the Sentinel 2 data. While the imperial penguins spend the winter on the spot, their excretions leave characteristic traces. In the area of the colonies, the feces color the ice surface brown, which is easier to see from space than the animals themselves.
The researchers were then able to specifically examine these brown areas on the MAXAR images and thus detect a colony of around 500 animals at Verleger Point in West Antarctica. These pictures even show individual penguins, which the team was able to count. In total, research has now identified 66 nesting sites of emperor penguins in Antarctica, half of which have been detected by satellites.
Even if the researchers call this good news: the situation is not completely rosy for the emperor penguins. The animals often breed on the sea ice, which is now also disappearing in Antarctica. They even had to give up one of their largest breeding colonies in the meantime because the ice in the region became too brittle. The latest calculations on climate change and its consequences assume that with the current warming, 80 percent of the colonies will disappear by the end of the century – unless the animals avoid land. "Like many of the recently discovered nesting sites, this one (at Verleger Point, note. D. Red.) small and located in a region that is severely affected by the current ice loss," says Fretwell.
