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- Title
Extreme dives by free-ranging emperor penguins.
- Authors
Wienecke, Barbara; Robertson, Graham; Kirkwood, Roger; Lawton, Kieran
- Abstract
We examined the incidence of extreme diving in a 3-year overwintering study of emperor penguins Aptenodytes forsteri in East Antarctica. We defined extreme dives as very deep (> 400 m) and/or very long (> 12 min). Of 137364 dives recorded by 93 penguins 264 dives reached depths > 400 m and 48 lasted > 12 min. Most (65%) very long dives occurred in winter (May–August) while 83% of the very deep dives took place in spring (September–November). The two most extreme dives (564 m depth, 21.8 min duration) were separate dives and were performed by different individual penguins. Penguins diving extremely deeply may have done so as part of their foraging strategy whereas penguins diving for very long times may have been forced to do so by changes in the sea-ice conditions.
- Subjects
EAST Antarctica (Antarctica); EMPEROR penguin; APTENODYTES; DIVING; DEEP diving; UNDERWATER exploration; PHYSIOLOGY; ANIMAL behavior
- Publication
Polar Biology, 2007, Vol 30, Issue 2, p133
- ISSN
0722-4060
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1007/s00300-006-0168-8