Image

Hunkering Down

March 16, 2018

An Adelie penguin hunches down over its nest as icy winds whip across Cape Royds on Ross Island during a 2007 Polar Discovery expedition. Adelie penguins are sentinel species of climate change. A recent study by WHOI researchers and colleagues uncovered some good news for the species—a previously unknown “supercolony” of more than 1.5 million Adelie penguins in the Danger Islands. Because of the remoteness of the chain of rocky islands off of the Antarctic Peninsula’s northern tip and the treacherous waters that surround them, researchers were not aware the islands harbored huge numbers of Adelies. (Photo by Chris Linder, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)