Threats to African Penguins & Penguin Conservation

[Toko]

Rapid fall in African penguin population ‘still not understood’

BY SUE BLAINE, 25 APRIL 2013, 13:37

THE rapid fall in African Penguin numbers was still not properly understood, University of Cape Town ecologist Les Underhill said on Thursday, unofficially declared World Penguin Day.

On April 25 the Antarctic’s Adelie Penguins begin their annual northward migration. Penguins live almost exclusively in the southern hemisphere, and especially in Antarctica.

According to the South African National Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds, at the end of the last century the African Penguin population had been reduced to about 10% of the estimated 1.5-million that existed in 1910, and African Penguin populations have declined by 95% since preindustrial times.

But all penguins were at risk, said Prof Underhill, director of the university’s Animal Demographics Unit.

"I don’t think there is a single species (of penguin) that can be said to be doing well, from the Galapagos islands to the Arctic," he said.

Penguins are a family of 17 to 19 species of birds that live primarily in the southern hemisphere, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature. They include the tiny Blue Penguins of Australia and New Zealand, also known as Fairy or Little Penguins, and the largest penguins — Antarctica’s Emperor Penguins. The Galapagos Penguin is the only one found north of the equator.

"The sad answer is that we are still not certain what the driving force is that is pushing down African Penguin numbers. There are lots of ideas," Prof Underhill said.

Bird Life South Africa coastal seabird conservation manager Christina Moseley said some of the theories were that guano scraping (the birds make their nests by burrowing into guano mounds) and egg collecting — banned in the 1960s — had eradicated large numbers of the African Penguin. Also, the birds’ prime food — anchovies and sardines — had changed their distribution since the mid-1990s, from the West Coast to the South Coast. Breeding African Penguins can swim only 40km from their nest in a day.

It was estimated 60% of African Penguin numbers counted in the early 1950s had "gone" in the last decade. In total 80% of South Africa and Namibia’s African Penguin populations had vanished since counting began in the 1950s, she said. These penguins occur nowhere else.

Bird Life South Africa was researching, with the government, "what happens if you stop fishing near (penguin) colonies", Ms Moseley said.

The work began in 2009 and would end next year.

It was too early to make any assessments regarding the West Coast colonies but preliminary research from one in Algoa Bay indicated a fishing ban helped, she said.

[Mel]

[Dewi]

H'mmm? obviously a thoroughly researched article.

I would agree wholeheartedly with the comment -

"I don’t think there is a single species (of penguin) that can be said to be doing well, from the Galapagos islands to the Arctic,"

In fact, Galapagos Penguins just sneak over the Equator to the Northern Hemisphere at the Northern tip of Isabella Island and are the only Penguin species to do so. The rest of them are definitely extinct North of here.

(I think Prof. Underhill got it right and whoever wrote this made a complete hash of it).

Gave me a good laugh on World Penguin Day.

The rest of the article is bad news though.

[Errol1]

Do fishing trawlers play a role in this and if so, how big is the role? Does anyone know if research has ever been done on the effect that fishing trawlers have on Penguin food supply? I would really like to know more about this

[Dewi]

Hi Errol,

It's not the trawlers per se that are the issue, but the overfishing overall which reduces the food supply. There are other factors that also affect them such as climate change, changing ocean currents, pollution and disturbance at nesting colonies.

African Penguins have been declining for decades now and no one is quite sure what the overriding cause is, despite many studies being done. Probably a combination of all of the above.

[Toko]

Competition with commercial fisheries for pelagic fish might be one of the threats .

Have a look here: IUCN

[Errol1]

Hi Errol,

It's not the trawlers per se that are the issue, but the overfishing overall which reduces the food supply. There are other factors that also affect them such as climate change, changing ocean currents, pollution and disturbance at nesting colonies.

African Penguins have been declining for decades now and no one is quite sure what the overriding cause is, despite many studies being done. Probably a combination of all of the above.

Thanks Dwei, what you say makes lots of sense, it would be wonderful if we as humans could really understand why such things happen...

[Toko]

Further reading here


No.35607 GOVERNMENT GAZETTE, 20 AUGUST 2012

DRAFT BIODIVERSITY MANAGEMENT PLAN FOR THE AFRICAN PENGUIN

[Dewi]

Cheers for the links Toko.

Agree Errol.

I have spent a lot of time with various penguin species at their colonies, so they are just a little bit special to me.

[Toko]

SANCCOB and SANParks: Burghers’ Walk Restoration Project

Posted: April 28, 2015

Every year hundreds of thousands of tourists from around the world are charmed by the wild African penguins which breed within the borders of the Boulder’s colony in Simon’s Town under the protection of Table Mountain National Park.

Right next door a group of penguins are breeding on unprotected public land. Early in the 1900s it was estimated that there were 3 million African penguins in the wild. In 2004 there were 58,000 breeding pairs. Today there are less than 21,000 breeding pairs left in the wild. Approximately 2,122 penguins are found in the Simon’s Town/Boulders area with 68% of these penguins living inside the park.

Burgher’s Walk is the scenic beach area located in Simon’s Town from Bellevue Road towards Windmill Beach, and is managed by the City of Cape Town. It is located on the Southern Boundary of the SANParks Managed Boulders Penguin Colony and 10km north of the Cape of Good Hope Section of the Table Mountain National Park and is approximately 1.63 ha in size.

The African Penguin (Spheniscus demersus), has chosen Burgher’s Walk as one of the areas to breed and moult.

Prior to 2008, the area was mainly utilised by local residents to walk their dogs. There were several incidents where unmanaged dogs attacked and killed penguins along this coastline. From 2008 there was however a marked increase in tour groups that started using this area.

The impact of these groups are varied, continuous and severe, including:

- Trampling of the area and soil erosion: the area is now so degraded that the only species growing in the high impact zone are exotic species.

- Trampling of penguin nests: there are several examples of this on site and staff have to monitor to check that the birds are not trampled to death, injured or trapped in a collapsed nest.

- Direct disturbance of penguins: People are going right up to penguins, trying to touch them, swinging camera slings and handbags at them to try and get “cute” photos.

There have been incidents of people picking up penguins, which off course results in the person being bitten, in turn the penguin gets hit, pushed or dropped for biting the person.

Penguins have been disturbed by tourists during moulting season (which is essentially a 14 – 21 day starvation period when the penguin cannot go to sea to feed or cool down – as it does not have any waterproof feathers) which results in the following situation:

Penguins nest once a year (in rare cases if it was an early breed, they may breed a second time). When the birds are disturbed during breeding time, they will abandon either their eggs or their chicks. The abandon chicks will starve to death, if not removed or found in time for rehabilitation. This disturbance may result in a cluster, eggs or chicks that are lost forever. We cannot afford for this to happen with the species being endangered.

The Burgher’s Walk Restoration Project is a coordinated plan to protect the African penguin colony at Boulders Beach from curious people, from predation by domestic animals and to protect them from being run over by cars speeding along the road above the site. Together SANParks, the City of Cape Town and SANCCOB are working towards making Burgher’s Walk a place where penguins and people can successfully co-exist. Funding goes towards the management of the terrain, the rehabilitation of penguins at SANCCOB, the salaries of penguin monitor staff, and the upkeep of the fencing and the formalised path.

Trained penguin monitors are central to the Burghers’ Walk Restoration Project as they carry out key activities and duties coupled with the project. These tasks include conservation and visitor management duties, monitoring, data collection, penguin protection, penguin sweeps and penguin relocation, rescuing injured, oiled or at risk penguins and other birds, assist with penguin rehabilitation by applying basic animal husbandry and first aid (as trained by SANCCOB and SANParks), record all penguins released by SANCCOB at Boulders in the database and maintaining penguin proof barriers, infrastructure, equipment and the natural environment.

To find out more about how to get involved in the Burgher’s Walk Restoration Project click here.