South Georgia Newsletter, August 2008

Oiled Penguins Tragedy

Large numbers of oiled penguins have come ashore in the past fortnight. Both Gentoo and King Penguins have been affected. Some birds are so badly oiled that they are completely black. The signs are worrying and South Georgia Government is taking steps to assess the scale of the problem and identify possible causes.

The first oiled bird, a Gentoo Penguin, was found at King Edward Point in early July. It seemed to be an isolated case. The bird was captured, cleaned and later released (see ‘snippets’ below). Then, later in August, four oiled penguins came up on beaches at Bird Island, to the far north of South Georgia. A couple of days later, people visiting the Gentoo Penguin roost at Maiviken found a worrying scene; they counted 26 oiled penguins out of just over 400 in the area; the oiling affecting 6.5% of the birds present. Since then several oiled birds can be seen ashore at any one time in the King Edward Cove area. Oiling varies from spatters to total immersion.

The source of the oil is unknown, but, since none of the inshore birds such as gulls, shags, ducks or terns have been seen with any oil on, most likely it was somewhere well offshore.

With most of the Island inaccessible to the few residents it has not been possible yet to establish the full extent of the problem. The obvious fear is that the large King Penguin colonies at St Andrews Bay and Salisbury Plain are affected. Efforts will be made shortly to reach some other areas and to see if the oiled birds are limited just to the northern and central area of the Island or are more widespread. At King Edward Point and Bird Island some of the oiled birds have been captured and samples of oiled feathers taken. Analysis of the oil samples taken from different areas of the Island should at least be able to establish if the oiling is from a single source. Unfortunately there are not the resources or manpower to enable more attempts to be made to clean affected penguins.

Bird Island News

By Gorfou, Zoological Field Assistant at the British Antarctic Survey Base at Bird Island

SNIP
As you know there are only four of us on Bird Island during the winter and you’ve probably heard that most of the Fur Seals and birds (penguins, albatrosses and petrels) leave the island and wander the Southern Ocean for a few months. Although it’s true for more than 90% of our furry and feathery inhabitants, we haven’t been abandoned by all of them.

Gentoo Penguins, there are hundreds of them coming ashore every evening to spend the night at the beach club.

King Penguins are occasional visitors, isolated individuals on an empty beach or with hundreds of Gentoo Penguins; the few birds we saw in August were sadly stained with oil… like at KEP.

South Georgia Snippets

Badly oiled penguins are not confined just to South Georgia, a widespread problem is being reported from all around the Falkland Islands and in Brazil hundreds of oiled penguins have been captured and hundreds more dead oiled penguins have washed up. Are these just isolated incidents or could something connect them?

The oiled penguins coming ashore at King Edward Point are occasionally appearing on the two webcams.

With so many badly oiled penguins being seen at South Georgia now, the efforts made to clean up the one Gentoo captured last month do not seem much, but the experience enriched our lives. The bird was kept for three weeks in the wet lab so it could be fed to improve its overall condition and to allow it time to preen and re-waterproof its feathers. Despite still having an injury to one wing the decision was taken to release it at the beginning of August as it stopped accepting food. The door to the wetlab was opened and the bird seemed very undecided whether to stay or go. It hopped out through the door, then hopped back in again, repeating the process several times, each time going a little further away before turning back. Eventually it got more adventurous and, hearing another Gentoo in the vicinity, followed the other bird’s calls down to the sea edge near the jetty. By then it was so excited to see another of its own kind it took a leap off the jetty edge to reach the other bird. The videoclips below shows the whole story…

The big storm overnight on August 19th registered at more than 60 knots in the sheltered Cove at King Edward Point. This sort of severe weather has in the past occurred at about the same time as the loss of the King Penguin chicks in the nascent colony at Penguin River. We were pleased then to find two of the original four chicks still surviving when they were visited shortly after. The four parent birds are regularly with the chicks and have been seen feeding them. Maybe these chicks can be the first to make it through the winter in this location.