Wildlife of the Antarctic Peninsula

This video is called Antarctica Expedition and Wildlife 2.

The Antarctic Peninsula, from the Drake Passage to Palmer Station, and as far south as Charcot Island, has much intereresting wildlife and scenery.

Like Adelie penguins, humpback whales, icebergs, glaciers, and elephant seals.

By James Lowen:

In the first instalment of this photo essay, I set out the seabirds and marine mammals that Antarctic tourists should look for as they steam from the southern tip of South America to the hallowed continent of Antarctica. The area is the subject of a new visitor’s guide, A visitor’s guide to the wildlife of the Antarctic Peninsula, Drake Passage and Beagle Channel, a fundraiser for BirdLife International’s Save the Albatross campaign.

Towards the end of the second day at sea, the first iceberg of the trip heralds the arrival of your Antarctic cruise ship at the South Shetland Islands or the Antarctic Peninsula itself. If you are very lucky, the iceberg might be covered with thousands of penguins.

Adelie penguins: here.

Albatrosses: here.

Humans apparently aren’t the only animals with a feminist movement. Female elephant seals from the South African sub-Antarctic Marion Island colony are protesting the system of hierarchy in their world the only way they know how — by taking to the water: here.

In 2013, researchers studying mosses and microbes growing at the southern end of the Antarctic Peninsula documented unprecedented ecological change over the last 50 years, driven by warming temperatures. Now, the same research group has confirmed that those striking changes in the Antarctic are widespread, occurring all across the Peninsula: here.

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