ORCID
0000-0001-7519-9278 (Dinniman)
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2025
DOI
10.1002/ecs2.70091
Publication Title
Ecosphere
Volume
16
Issue
2
Pages
e70091 (1-19)
Abstract
Pygoscelis penguins interact with both terrestrial and marine environments, especially during the austral summer when they raise their chicks. Accessible ice-free ground spaces serve as locations for penguins to build colonies and successfully raise chicks while the surrounding marine environment serves as the foraging grounds for adult birds. Penguins must be able to navigate through the waters around their colonies to forage for Antarctic krill (Euphausia superba), their primary prey during the austral summer. Krill, whose distributions are driven partially by the surrounding physics and partially by their behaviors, must also be plentiful in the waters near the colonies to support foraging penguins. Here, we test the hypothesis that terrestrial and oceanographic variables can describe habitat suitability for Pygoscelis penguins along the West Antarctic Peninsula (WAP) during the austral summer and hypothesize that oceanographic and terrestrial covariates contribute differently to each species based on their life-histories. We built habitat suitability models using logistic regressions with a variety of datasets and determined important covariates using jackknife analysis. We developed a novel method to estimate the contribution of oceanographic and terrestrial covariates using the model terms. Models performed well across all species (area under the curve [AUC] >0.85) and predicted existing habitats as highly suitable for each species. The models also predicted new habitat for each species, including potential habitat for gentoo penguins in Marguerite Bay. While jackknife analysis suggests that terrestrial elevation is the single most important variable for some species, variables such as spring sea ice extent, prey persistence, and near-shore current velocities also were major contributors to the model across the Peninsula. Oceanographic covariates contributed the most (similar to 65%) to chinstrap penguin habitat suitability, and the least (20%-40%) to Adelie habitat suitability. Different oceanographic variables made up most of this oceanographic term for different species, suggesting that the species select for different oceanographic habitats near breeding colonies. Understanding the major habitat suitability drivers for Pygoscelis penguins today will help us understand how habitat suitability will change in future climate conditions.
Rights
© 2025 The Authors.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Data Availability
Article states: "Datasets utilized for this research are found in DiGirolamo et al. (2022), Gallagher (2023a, 2023b, 2024a, 2024b), Howat et al. (2019), Humphries et al. (2017), and Palmer Station Antarctica and Fraser (2020)."
Original Publication Citation
Gallagher, K. L., Herman, R., Walton, K., Dinniman, M. S., & Lynch, H. J. (2025). Pygoscelis penguins prefer different oceanographic and terrestrial habitats during the austral summer. Ecosphere, 16(2), 1-19, Article e70091. https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.70091
Repository Citation
Gallagher, Katherine L.; Herman, Rachel; Walton, Katherine; Dinniman, Michael S.; and Lynch, Heather J., "Pygoscelis Penguins Prefer Different Oceanographic and Terrestrial Habitats During the Austral Summer" (2025). OES Faculty Publications. 535.
https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/oeas_fac_pubs/535
Appendix S1
Included in
Environmental Studies Commons, Marine Biology Commons, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology Commons, Poultry or Avian Science Commons