Preparing for the 2009 Field Season
In 2008 fledging success of Black
Guillemots was again low. Unlike past years, when
chicks died as a result of prospecting Horned Puffins
occupying nest sites and a lack of arctic cod, in 2008
chicks had to deal with snow storms blocking nest
entrances and stranded polar bears flipping over nests as
they scavenged the beaches for food.
The 2009 field season promises to be
another interesting one as the
melt season
begins with the Arctic Basin having a large percentage of
thin first-year ice, according to the National Snow and
Ice Data Center. Should ice melt progress as it has in
recent years the period when parents are feeding chicks
(late July to early September) will see the pack ice
retreat well away from the island. Black Guillemots
will then be unable to find arctic cod, their preferred
prey and most accessible under pack ice. Should the
ice retreat rapidly and strand polar bears on the beach,
the guillemots and puffins breeding on the island (and the
researchers studying them) will have to deal with
displaced bears wandering the island looking for food.
Although the small carbon-footprint of
our field camp complicates communications from Cooper
Island, we hope to be able to provide regular text and
photo updates to this website during the June-September
field season. Please check back to see what is happening
with the birds, the ice, the bears and us as the summer
progresses.
Cooper Island research
featured in national Polar-Palooza Tour
The long-term data set on seabird
breeding biology, as well as recent observations on the
increase of polar bears on the Alaskan Beaufort Sea coast
are being included in an International Polar Year public
outreach and education program called
Polar-Palooza: Stories from a changing planet.
George Divoky participated in
Polar-Palooza public presentations and teacher workshops
last April in Salt Lake City and Norman, Oklahoma, this
fall in Cleveland and Richmond, Virginia and in January
2009 in Brownsville and Houston, Texas. A video produced for Polar-Palooza on Cooper Island
research and shown on National Geographic television last
April is
available at this link.
Recent Polar-Palooza presentations have
featured a rap/pop video presenting lyrics and images that
urge the listener to "Take AIM at Climate Change" -
with AIM standing for Adapt, Innovate and Mitigate. Click
on
this link to see the video on YouTube.
Polar-Palooza presentations
have also featured video of polar bears visiting
Cooper Island in 2007 and 2008. Once extremely rare
visitors to the island, they are now regular in late July and
August. There is a video on YouTube of a
polar bear that visited our research cabin in mid-August
2008.
.
Recent publication
The impacts of changes in arctic pack ice on Cooper
Island seabirds are included in a recent publication
that examines the biological consequences of ice melt in
the Arctic and Antarctic:
High latitude changes in ice dynamics and their impact on
polar marine ecosystems
Moline, M. A., N. J. Karnovsky, Z. Brown, G. J. Divoky, T.
R. Frazer, C. A. Jacoby, J. J. Torres and W. R. Fraser.
2008. Pp 267-319 in: The Year in Ecology and
Conservation Biology 2008. R. S. Ostfeld and W. H.
Schlesinger (eds.). Annals New York Acad. Sci.,
1134.
View or download the publication at this link.
Learn more about our research.
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