Ocean Sentry
An endangered species of penguin is mysteriously disappearing from a remote British island in the South Atlantic at a rate of 100 birds every day. About two million northern rockhopper penguins have vanished from Tristan da Cunha and Gough Island, part of the British overseas territory of St Helena, in half a century.
The once huge penguin populations on the islands have dwindled so dramatically that they are now threatened with extinction, and the British Government was accused yesterday of contributing to the decline. A 90 per cent slump has been observed in both areas but on Tristan it took 130 years whereas it took just 45 years on Gough, where northern rockhopper penguins, Eudyptes moseleyi, have vanished at a rate of 100 a day.
Trevor Glass, the conservation officer on Tristan da Cunha, carries out frequent counts of the penguins and has been alarmed at the fall.
“Rockies are one of Tristan’s most charismatic birds and a bird we are used to seeing in good numbers on all the islands,” he said. “These unexplained declines are really worrying and we’ll do everything we can to understand what is going on.”
Climate change and overfishing are among the possible causes but ornithologists are baffled by the fall and are anxious for a research project to be conducted to identify whatever is killing the penguins.
(By Lewis Smith)
