Scientists issue warning as thousands of rare penguins starve to death

In a devastating blow to wildlife, thousands of critically endangered African penguins have starved to death in South Africa due to a drastic decline in their main food source

A very sad finding has come out within the animal kingdom. Thousands of critically endangered penguins have starved to death in South Africa.

Experts have reportedly been blaming overfishing and climate change for the catastrophic decline in their main food source. With fewer than 32,000 left in the wild and populations plummeting by nearly 80% in just three decades, researchers fear the species could vanish from the wild next decade.

The African penguin was officially upgraded to “Critically Endangered” on the The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List this year. There are now fewer than 32,000 left in the wild, a dramatic plunge from 282,000 in 1957 and 35,400 mature birds as recently as 2019.

Experts from the University of Exeter and South Africa’s Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment have reportedly said that between 2004 and 2011, two major breeding colonies near Cape Town, South Africa, collapsed. An estimated 62,000 penguins have been wiped out, with some areas seeing numbers nosedive by a staggering 95% in just eight years.

Sardines, the penguins’ favourite snack, have all but vanished from local waters, thanks to a toxic cocktail of overfishing and rising sea temperatures, the Canary reported.

Penguins moult once a year, shedding all their feathers and leaving them stranded on land for three weeks without food or water.

Conservation biologist Dr Richard Sherley, co-author of the study, explained: “They are evolved to build up fat and then to fast whilst their body metabolises those reserves, and the protein in their muscles, to get them through moult. They then need to be able to regain body condition rapidly afterwards.

“So, essentially, if food is too hard to find before they moult or immediately afterwards, they will have insufficient reserves to survive the fast.”

The penguins’ plight is reportedly made worse by the stress and noise from hordes of tourists flocking to see them, putting even more pressure on these much-loved birds.

At the current rate of decline, experts reportedly fear African penguins could vanish from the wild entirely by 2035.

In a race against time, authorities have slapped fishing bans around key colonies, built artificial nests, and started new colonies in a bid to save the species.

Dr Sherley said: “We hope that the recent conservation interventions put in place, together with reduced exploitation rates of sardine when its abundance is less than the 25% of maximum threshold, will begin to arrest the decline and that the species will show some signs of recovery.”

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