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The ecosystem evolution of penguin colonies in the past 8,500 years on Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica

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Abstract

Penguin colony is one of the Earth’s simplest ecosystems. As the seabird with the largest population in Antarctica, penguin is a unique indicator of Antarctic environment and climate changes. In this study, we collected an ornithogenic sediment core from Gardner Island in Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica, reconstructed an 8,500 years variation history of penguin population and vegetation abundance on this island, and examined the evolution of the penguin colony. We used the levels of two molecular markers cholesterol and cholestanol as the proxy indicators of penguin population size. Other molecular markers, including C24:0 alkenoic acid, C18 n-alkanol and phytol were used as the proxy indicators of aquatic moss, algae, and general vegetation, respectively. It is shown that the growth of algae was mainly affected by the nutritional supply from penguin droppings, so their abundance was positively linked with penguin population. The growth of aquatic moss, however, was controlled more by the degree of water body transparency than by nutrient availability. Because the pollution of water body increased as penguin population grew, aquatic moss abundance showed a seesaw-like relationship with penguin population. These results suggested that penguins played a dominant role in this simple ecosystem in the Antarctic environment. The reconstructed relationship between penguin population and vegetation abundance may offer new insights to understand ancient Antarctic environment and ecology.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the Chinese Arctic and Antarctic Administration, Australian Antarctic Division, CHINARE22 team in Zhongshan Station and the members of Davis Station for their support and assistance in the field working. We thank Prof. Renbin Zhu for sample collection. This study was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 40730107), the National Science and Technology Supporting Program (2006BAB18B07), the State Key Laboratory of Organic Geochemistry foundation (OGL-200606) and the Australia Antarctic Division Science Project (AAD2873).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Polar Environment, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, China

    Jing Huang & Liguang Sun

  2. Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Science, Guangzhou, 510640, Guangdong, China

    Jing Huang & Xinming Wang

  3. Department of Dairy Science, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, 53706, USA

    Wen Huang

  4. NIH Chemical Genomics Center, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, 20892, USA

    Yuhong Wang

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  1. Jing Huang
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  2. Liguang Sun
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  3. Wen Huang
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  4. Xinming Wang
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Correspondence to Liguang Sun.

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Huang, J., Sun, L., Huang, W. et al. The ecosystem evolution of penguin colonies in the past 8,500 years on Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica. Polar Biol 33, 1399–1406 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-010-0832-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-010-0832-x

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