Overview
- First summary of the foraging ecology and marine lives of penguins
- Comparative analysis and summary of the available marine-related literature on penguins
- Perspective of penguins as bellwethers of the health of marine ecosystems
Part of the book series: Fascinating Life Sciences (FLS)
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Table of contents (15 chapters)
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Front Matter
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In the Beginning
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Front Matter
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Penguin Marine Haunts and Food Habits
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Front Matter
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The Hardware of a Fish-Bird
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Front Matter
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The Software of Fish-Birds
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Front Matter
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Penguins in a Fickle Environment
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Front Matter
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Keywords
About this book
Centuries ago, when penguins were first encountered by European explorers, they were not thought to be birds but rather a fish-like relative. Subsequent accumulation of knowledge has shown penguins to be an avian species with unrivaled aquatic attributes, owing to a number of evolutionary adaptations: shape change, low drag, ability to regulate buoyancy, and extraordinary surface compliancy from their featheration. They are indeed the most extremely specialized diving bird, having given up flight (which otherwise is hugely advantageous) to the benefit of underwater prowess (such as speed, maneuverability and an ability to exploit an extraordinary range of depths). This flightlessness, however, also comes with costs that are substantial for a seabird (such as the inability to cover large distances quickly in reaction to ephemeral prey); and the energy needed to cope with moving through an aqueous environment, which is more resistant than air. For penguins, the high energetic costs inexploiting the ocean environment thus makes them especially sensitive to changes in food availability or their access to their prey.
While a number of “penguin books” cover the natural history, mainly of breeding aspects, few address in much detail the incredible aquatic nature of these creatures. A huge amount of information has been amassed over recent past decades thanks to dramatic advances in microelectronics, bio-logging and maturation of some long-term studies of penguin life history. This work represents an integration of all these data with charts, maps and graphs, along with richly illustrated photos by experts in the field.
Authors and Affiliations
About the authors
Rory Wilson is a professor in zoology within the department of biosciences at Swansea University, Wales, UK. He too, has been actively working with penguins for more than 40 years with understanding their marine ecology being his primary research thrust. His work involves developing and using new methods, particularly animal-attached tags, to study the behavioral ecology of enigmatic animals that are, otherwise, difficult to study. He has worked with ten penguin species but has also been involved in work in Africa, both Americas, Antarctica, Australia, the far- and middle East and Europe, with animals as diverse as albatrosses, armadillos, badgers, cheetahs, condors, sharks and sloths. He was bestowed a Rolex Award for Enterprise in 2006 for his animal tag developments. He was chief scientific consultant for Nat Geo’s highly acclaimed 7-part series, ‘Great Migrations’, is listed in the top 50 conservationists in the BBC power list and is a Fellow of both the Learned Society of Wales and of Academia Europaea
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: The Aquatic World of Penguins
Book Subtitle: Biology of Fish-Birds
Authors: David G Ainley, Rory P Wilson
Series Title: Fascinating Life Sciences
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-33990-5
Publisher: Springer Cham
eBook Packages: Biomedical and Life Sciences, Biomedical and Life Sciences (R0)
Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-031-33989-9Published: 11 November 2023
Softcover ISBN: 978-3-031-33992-9Due: 12 December 2023
eBook ISBN: 978-3-031-33990-5Published: 10 November 2023
Series ISSN: 2509-6745
Series E-ISSN: 2509-6753
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XXII, 567
Number of Illustrations: 18 b/w illustrations, 198 illustrations in colour
Topics: Ecology, Animal Physiology, Animal Anatomy / Morphology / Histology, Animal Anatomy / Morphology / Histology