CHINSTRAP PENGUIN COLONY ON ZAVODOVSKI ISLAND SHRINKS BY 63%

A study by the British Antarctic Survey has found that the number of occupied chinstrap penguin nests on Zavodovski Island fell by 63 per cent between 2011 and 2025. The research, published in the journal Current Biology, recorded a decline in breeding chinstraps from 1.09 million to 402,000 on the island. Zavodovski, a volcanic island in the South Sandwich Islands, a British overseas territory north of Antarctica, had been home to the world's largest penguin colony but has now lost that status, according to the study. The researchers said the largest colony is now at Cape Adare in the Ross Sea, on the opposite side of Antarctica. Professor Norman Ratcliffe, a penguin ecologist at the survey who led the study, described the fall as "an enormous population crash".

Zavodovski lies around 2,000km from the nearest permanent human settlement and is roughly twice the size of Gibraltar. To reach it, researchers sailed for more than a fortnight and used drone surveys, aerial photography and tracking devices fitted to the penguins. Chinstrap penguins, named for the dark line running under their beaks, feed mainly on Antarctic krill, small shrimp-like creatures, and tracking data showed the birds prefer feeding in cooler waters to the northwest of the island. Prof Ratcliffe said the island had for years appeared to avoid the chinstrap decline reported elsewhere across Antarctica and its surrounding islands, but researchers now say it is recording the fastest rate of chinstrap decline anywhere in the world.

Prof Ratcliffe said chinstraps have specialist diets and specific ocean temperature preferences, which he said makes the decline concerning. He attributed the krill's movement to warming waters, saying that as conditions change, the krill have shifted southwards into the Weddell Sea, away from the penguins' preferred feeding grounds. The British Antarctic Survey's findings point to the climate crisis as the most likely cause of the colony's decline, according to the study. No further survey or monitoring plans were specified in the findings published this week.