Italian raises penguin alarm

Birds "silent" victims of climate change and pollution (ANSA) - Rome,
September 12 - An Italian expert has warned that the world's penguin
population is a "silent" victim of climate change and other human-made
threats. Fabrizio Carbone, a nature journalist who has just written a book
about the flightless birds, says penguin numbers are falling at a constant
and alarming rate .

They are under fire from the fishing industry, oil spillages and other forms
of marine pollution, habitat loss, and the effects of global warming and
melting ice caps, he says .

As a result, five of the 17 penguin species are 'endangered', which means
they are facing a high risk of extinction in the near future, or
'vulnerable', with a high risk of extinction in the medium-term .

"The silent victims of this complex environmental situation are the four
species that live in Antarctica - the emperor, Adelie, chinstrap and
macaroni penguins," he said .

"Then we have the species that populate other parts of the southern
hemisphere. Almost all of them are at the point of no return .

"The conservation classifications put them one step away from the various
'red' lists of species that, from now on, are in danger of extinction" .

Since penguins spend about half of their time at sea looking for food, all
of the species are affected by over-fishing and run the risk of getting
tangled in nets and drowning .

Pollution and climate change are disrupting the aquatic birds' breeding and
feeding grounds, with warmer currents driving away prey .

The greenhouse effect is eating away at the habitats of the Antarctic
penguins too .

"The ice of the Antarctic is melting faster than at any other time in our
planet's history, which is billions of years long," Carbone said. The
journalist also pointed out that the survival of one of the rarest species,
New Zealand's yellow-eyed penguin, is in peril because of predators like
weasels, dogs and cats. These predators did not exist in the birds' natural
environment until man introduced them .