Adelie Penguins

Adelie penguins

Antarctic Peninsula

Photograph by Dr. George Somero

     Dr. Richard Worthington knew that the slow dying of populations would take a long time, perhaps a couple of centuries.  Palmer Station was on the Antarctic Peninsula, an arm that reached fom the main body of the continent toward the tip of South America.  The Station was at 64 degrees south, on the warm side of the Antarctic Circle at 67 degrees south.  So the peninsula would warm more quickly that the polar heart of Antarctica.  Penguins would survive in diminishing numbers, laying their eggs in diminishing numbers, hatching their chicks in diminishing numbers.  The warming would be slow, until there were only a few lingering survivors.

     These birds--birds that had once learned how to swim--could perhaps adapt to a slow change of climate, a change that stretched over thousands of years.  But they probably could not adapt to changes tht came in the course of a few decades, or even a few centuries.

               John Slade

              Climate Change and the Oceans

               http://www.woodgateintl.com/