Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-8ctnn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T08:19:09.508Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Stable isotope analysis of ancient and modern gentoo penguin egg membrane and the krill surplus hypothesis in Antarctica

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 March 2013

Steven D. Emslie ,
Michael J. Polito  and
William P. Patterson
Steven D. Emslie*
Affiliation:
Department of Biology and Marine Biology, University of North Carolina, Wilmington, NC 28403, USA
Michael J. Polito
Affiliation:
Department of Biology and Marine Biology, University of North Carolina, Wilmington, NC 28403, USA
William P. Patterson
Affiliation:
Department of Geological Sciences, University of Saskatchewan, 114 Science Place, Saskatoon SK S7N 5E2, Canada
*
[email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The ‘krill surplus’ hypothesis in Antarctica posits that the historic depletion of krill-eating whales and seals in the 18–20th centuries provided a surplus of krill in the Southern Ocean that benefited penguins. A previous study which examined stable isotopes in ancient and modern tissues of Adélie penguin (Pygoscelis adeliae) provides support for this hypothesis. Specifically, a significant decrease in δ13C and δ15N values occurred in modern versus ancient tissues from an apparent dietary shift from fish to krill associated with the purported krill surplus. Here, we present new data on gentoo penguin (Pygoscelis papua) tissues from active and abandoned colonies at three locations in the Antarctic Peninsula. We found an overall, but weak, decrease in modern versus fossil δ15N and δ13C values of gentoo penguin egg membrane with considerable variation across three breeding sites. Dietary mixing models suggest that shifts between fish and krill in gentoo penguins were likely not as strong as those previously observed in Adélie penguins. This weaker signal probably results from the greater reliance on fish in their diets, past and present, though we cannot rule out declines in primary productivity or other ecosystem shifts which also could account for declines in δ13C and δ15N values.

Keywords

abandoned colonies, δ13Cδ15N, dietary shifts, Pygoscelis papua, Suess effect
Type
Research Articles
Information
Antarctic Science , Volume 25 , Issue 2: Byers Peninsula – A New Reference Site For The Maritime Antarctic , April 2013 , pp. 213 - 218
Copyright
Copyright © Antarctic Science Ltd 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Atkinson, A., Siegel, V., Pakhomov, E.Rothery, P. 2004. Long-term decline in krill stock and increase in salps within the Southern Ocean. Nature, 432, 100–103.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bond, A.L.Jones, I.L. 2009. A practical introduction to stable-isotope analysis for seabird biologists: approaches, cautions and caveats. Marine Ornithology, 37, 183–188.Google Scholar
Ducklow, H.W., et al. 2007. Marine pelagic ecosystems: the west Antarctic Peninsula. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, B362, 67–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Emslie, S.D.Patterson, W.P. 2007. Abrupt recent shift in δ13C and δ15N values in Adélie penguin eggshell in Antarctica. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 104, 11 666–11 669.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Emslie, S.D., Baumann, K.van Tuinen, M. 2011. Late Holocene occupation of gentoo penguins (Pygoscelis papua) on Byers Peninsula, Livingston Island, Antarctica. Polar Biology, 34, 283–290.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Emslie, S.D., Ritchie, P.Lambert, D. 2003. Late-Holocene penguin occupation and diet at King George Island, Antarctic Peninsula. Antarctic Research Series, 79, 171–180.Google Scholar
Fraser, W.R., Trivelpiece, W.Z., Ainley, D.G.Trivelpiece, S.G. 1992. Increases in Antarctic penguin populations: reduced competition with whales or a loss of sea ice due to environmental warming? Polar Biology, 11, 525–531.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hilton, G.M., Thompson, D.R., Sagar, P.M., Cuthbert, R.J., Cherel, Y.Bury, S.J. 2006. A stable isotopic investigation into the causes of decline in a sub-Antarctic predator, the rockhopper penguin Eudyptes chrysocome. Global Change Biology, 12, 611–625.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huang, T., Sun, L.Wang, Y. 2010. Past trophic level changes of Adélie penguin and fur seal and their ecological implications. Proceedings of 18th International Conference on Environmental Indicators, Hefei, China: International Society of Environmental Indicators, 31.Google Scholar
Jablonski, B. 1985. The diet of penguins on King George Island, South Shetland Islands. Acta Zoologica Cracoviensia, 29, 117–186.Google Scholar
Laws, R.M. 1977. Seals and whales of the Southern Ocean. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, B279, 81–96.Google Scholar
Laws, R.M. 1985. The ecology of the Southern Ocean. American Scientist, 73, 26–40.Google Scholar
Lescroël, A.Bost, C. 2005. Foraging under contrasting oceanographic conditions: the gentoo penguin at Kerguelen Archipelago. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 302, 245–261.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lorenzini, S., Olmastroni, S., Pezzo, F., Salvatore, M.C.Baroni, C. 2009. Holocene Adélie penguin diet in Victoria Land, Antarctica. Polar Biology, 32, 1077–1086.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McNeil, B.I., Matear, R.J.Tilbrook, B. 2001. Does carbon 13 track arthopogenic CO2 in the Southern Ocean. Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 15, 597–613.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, A.K., Kappes, M.A., Trivelpiece, S.G.Trivelpiece, W.Z. 2010. Foraging-niche separation of breeding gentoo and chinstrap penguins, South Shetland Islands, Antarctica. Condor, 112, 683–695.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mizutani, H.Wada, E. 1988. Nitrogen and carbon isotope ratios in seabird rookeries and their ecological implications. Ecology, 69, 340–349.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Montes-Hugo, M., Doney, S.C., Ducklow, H.W., Fraser, W., Martinson, D., Stammerjohn, S.E.Schofield, O. 2009. Recent changes in phytoplankton communities associated with rapid regional climate change along the western Antarctic Peninsula. Science, 323, 1470–1473.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Parnell, A.C., Inger, R., Bearhop, S.Jackson, A.L. 2010. Source partitioning using stable isotopes: coping with too much variation. PLoS One, 5, e9672.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Polito, M.J., Fisher, S., Tobias, C.R.Emslie, S.D. 2009. Tissue-specific isotopic discrimination factors in gentoo penguin (Pygoscelis papua) egg components: implications for dietary reconstructions using stable isotopes. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, 372, 106–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Polito, M.J., Lynch, H.J., Naveen, R.Emslie, S.D. 2011. Stable isotopes reveal regional heterogeneity in the pre-breeding distribution and diets of sympatrically breeding Pygoscelis penguins. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 421, 265–277.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
R Development Core Team. 2007. R: a language and environment for statistical computing. Vienna: Wirtschafts University, http://www.R-project.orgGoogle Scholar
Sladen, W.J.L. 1964. The distribution of the Adelie and chinstrap penguins. In Carrick, R., Holdgate, M.W. & Prevost, J.,eds. Biologie Antarctique. Paris: Hermann, 359–365.Google Scholar
Smith, R.C., Domack, E., Emslie, S., Fraser, W., Ainley, D.G., Baker, K., Kennett, J., Leventer, A., Stammerjohn, S., Mosley-Thompson, E.Vernet, M. 1999. Marine ecosystem sensitivity to climate change. BioScience, 49, 393–404.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stuiver, M.Reimer, P.J. 1993. Extended 14C database and revised CALIB 3.0 14C age calibration program. Radiocarbon, 35, 215–230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trivelpiece, W.Z., Bengtson, J.L., Trivelpiece, S.G.Volkman, N.J. 1986. Foraging behavior of gentoo and chinstrap penguins as determined by new radio-telemetry techniques. Auk, 103, 777–781.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trivelpiece, W.Z., Hinke, J.T., Miller, A.K., Reiss, C.S., Trivelpiece, S.G.Watters, G.M. 2011. Variability in krill biomass links harvesting and climate warming to penguin population changes in Antarctica. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 108, 7625–7628.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Trivelpiece, W.Z., Trivelpiece, S.G.Volkman, N.J. 1987. Ecological segregation of Adélie, gentoo and chinstrap penguins at King George Island, Antarctica. Ecology, 68, 351–361.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, J., Want, Y., Wang, X.Sun, L. 2007. Penguins and vegetations on Ardley Island, Antarctica: evolution in the past 2,400 years. Polar Biology, 30, 1475–1481.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, T.D. 1995. The penguins. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 295 pp.Google Scholar
Zhu, R., Sun, L., Yin, X., Xie, Z.Liu, X. 2005. Geochemical evidence for rapid enlargement of a gentoo penguin colony on Barton Peninsula in the maritime Antarctic. Antarctic Science, 17, 11–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar