Bad News for the African Penguin:  The beleagured African Penguin’s problems are not over yet.  The bird was recently uplisted on the IUCN (International Union for the Conservation of Nature) Red Data List from Vulnerable  to Endangered as population declines continue to be recorded.  Historically, the birds were used as a food source by South Africa’s first European settlers who arrived at the Cape of Good Hope (Cape Town) in 1652.  The leader of the Dutch settlers, Jan van Riebeck, in fact banned catching penguins for food as he foresaw that the penguin populations would decline to unsustainable levels if hunting continued.  In the 20th century, the penguins’ real problems began.  Their eggs were collected until as late as the mid-1960s.  Guano was scraped from off-shore islands where the birds breed to be used as fertilizer.  This had a tremendous negative impact as the birds make burrows in the guano to nest in; this protects the eggs from the elements and predators and keeps the incubation temperatures constant.  This practice was eventually stopped. Then, in the 1950s, disaster struck again. 

African Penguins as well as other seabirds occurring along the southern African west coast rely mainly on sardine and anchovy fish species for food.  These fish used to occur in huge numbers off the west coast due to the tremendous supply of nutrients available as a result of the cold Benguela Current moving north from Antarctica.  The Namibian and South African fishing industry promptly cashed in; in those days, there were no quotas and it was not long before the region became over-fished and the populations of these species crashed as a result.  This not only caused the demise of the fishing industry in those areas, particularly in southern Namibia, but it also had a severe impact on local African Penguin and Cape Gannet populations.  Being good fliers, the Cape Gannets were less affected as they were able to fly north to better feeding grounds.  Not so the African Penguin, which is largely flightless and mainly forages in the water.  Its foraging range is restricted to around 40 km, so it was unable to find food.  Studies have confirmed that there is a direct correlation between lack of food availability and poor breeding success in African Penguins.  While populations of these anchovy and sardine species have recovered somewhat, they are still subject to unexplained population fluctuations.  The purse-seine industry also continues to trawl off the southern African west coast.  It seems that there is still not sufficient food for the African Penguin, whose population continues to plummet.  It is only found off the southern African west coast, although populations have migrated further east and there is also a population on various islands off Port Elizabeth (Eastern Cape), where access is restricted and the birds are protected.

In addition, large populations of African Penguins are found perliously close to one of South Africa’s harbours, Cape Town.  There are constant oil spillages.  Apart from well-documented disasters such as the grounding of oil tankers, there are continual small oil spills from a variety of accidental and intended causes (such as ships washing out their bunkers illegally off-shore).  While the problem is containable as volunteers and organizations such as SACCOB (a South African NGO dedicated to saving threatened seabirds) actively de-oil penguins, enabling the vast majority to return to the wild, it is a further problem for the birds to contend with.

Will exploding human populations competing with wildlife and birds for food and resources result in the ultimate demise of the African Penguin?  We hope not.  For too long the oceans have been seen as an limitless food basket, as well as a dumping ground for waste and contamination.  It’s time countries (including South Africa) began cleaning up their act, sticking to fishing quotas and ensuring that there is some food left for the birds and wildife who share this planet with us.

Good News for Cape Gannets:  Here’s a wonderful story of people doing good.  An extended summer and late winter led to an unexpected later-than-usual breeding season for the Vulnerable Cape Gannet.  However, nature called and the adults responded to their age-old instinct to migrate to their winter breeding grounds leaving hundreds of chicks too small to make the journey behind (many were still dependent on the adults for food and other resources).  SACCOB came to the rescue, taking quantities of birds to their facilities, where they will be hand-reared until they are old and strong enough to be released into the wild again.  The process should take about two months.