Penguins: The luckiest birds alive

Penguins' extraordinary ability to survive in the Antarctic is down to an accident of evolution - the heating system in their wings. Roger Dobson explains

Wednesday, 23 February 2011

Penguins may owe their survival in the coldest and most inhospitable place on earth to evolutionary chance during a period of global warming millions of years ago. Far from adapting to the cold in Antarctica, where temperatures can plunge below minus 60C and wind speeds reach in excess of 200mph, they have been able to thrive because of a form of central heating of the wings they evolved when the climate on Earth was hot.

New research shows that when the earth warmed up nearly 50 millions years ago, penguins evolved a wing heating system, a highly efficient heat exchanger.

The mechanism, which is so effective that the birds have to cool down after vigorous swimming in sub-zero waters, evolved to help the birds keep warm while foraging in ever deeper, ever cooler waters.

more

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/nature/penguins-the-luckiest-birds-alive-2222886.html

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/09/100906145115.htm
Most Penguin Populations Continue to Decline, Biologists Warn
ScienceDaily (Sep. 9, 2010) — Penguin biologists from around the world, who are gathered in Boston the week of September 6, warn that ten of the planet's eighteen penguin species have experienced further serious population declines. The effects of climate change, overfishing, chronic oil pollution and predation by introduced mammals are among the major factors cited repeatedly by penguin scientists as contributing to these population drops. Prior to the conference, thirteen of these penguin species were already classified as endangered or threatened. Some penguin species may face extinction in this century.

We'll have to suck it up, and yeah we'll lose some of our numbers, but fewer humans means things will eventually stabilize.

;-)