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Cryospheric and Polar Processes Division Seminar |
CIRES' Cryospheric and Polar Processes Division hosts this seminar at CIRES' National Snow and Ice Data Center [ About NSIDC ] . To receive e-mail announcments of the seminars or for more information, contact Cindy Brekke (303-492-0498, brekke@kryos.colorado.edu). | |
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Linking demographic models and IPCC climate predictions: are emperor penguins marching to extinction?January 23, 2009, Friday, 10:30 AM Stéphanie Jenouvrier In the face of climate change, there is a growing demand for accurate forecasts of its environmental, ecological and societal impacts. To project the ecological responses to climate changes, collaborations between ecologists and climatologists are crucial. As an interdisciplinary team, we linked demographic models and climate projections to forecast emperor penguin population responses to climate change in Antarctica. Antarctic sea ice extent (SIE) is projected to shrink as concentration of atmospheric greenhouse gases (GHG) increases, and emperor penguins are extremely sensitive to these changes because they use sea ice as a habitat for breeding and feeding. We projected emperor penguin population responses to future sea ice changes using a stochastic population model that combines a unique long-term demographic data set (1962- 2005) from a colony in Terre Adélie (Antarctica) and projections of SIE from General Circulation Models (GCM) of Earth's climate included in the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment report. We show that the median population size is projected to decline from approximately 3000 today to 400 breeding pairs by 2100. To avoid extinction, Emperor penguins will have to adapt or migrate. However, given the future projected increase in GHGs and its effect on Antarctic climate, adaptation seems unlikely for such long-lived species. Future work will be to compare population responses over the entire species range, taking into account migration, especially since contrasted warming trends are expected among Antarctic regions (IPCC). |
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