Journeys with Emperors: Tracking the World's Most Extreme Penguin

By Gerald L. Kooyman, Jim Mastro and Jessica Ulrika Meir

With stunning photographs from the ice edge, a firsthand account of a researcher’s time in Antarctica and of the perilous journeys of the world’s largest penguin species: the iconic emperor.   Nearly all emperor penguin colonies are extremely remote; of the sixty-six known, fewer than thirty have been visited by humans, and even fewer have been the subject of successful research programs. One of the largest known emperor penguin colonies is found on a narrow band of sea ice attached to the Antarctic continent. In Journeys with Emperors, Gerald L. Kooyman and Jim Mastro take us to this far-flung colony in the Ross Sea, showing us how scientists gained access to it, and what they learned while living among the penguins as they raised their chicks.
 
The primary mission was to record the birds’ activities at sea, and the data revealed important aspects of emperor penguin behavior and physiology: for instance, that in the course of hunting for food, some of the penguins dive to depths of greater than five hundred meters (a third of a mile, which is deeper than for any other diving bird). The researchers also discovered that, crucially, most of the emperor’s life is actually spent at sea, with fledged chicks and adults making separate, perilous journeys through icy water. When chick nurturing is complete, the fledglings abandon the colony in large groups, heading north to the Southern Ocean. The adults leave at the same time, traveling one thousand kilometers eastward across the Ross Sea to a sea-ice sanctuary for molting. During this journey, they must gain enough weight to survive the month-long molt, when every feather is replaced and the birds cannot enter the water to feed. After the molt, many if not most return to the colony to breed once again. For the males, this means another fast—this time for 120 days as they incubate their eggs. The nearness of the colony to the ice edge spared the penguins the long, energy-draining march for which other colonies are well-known. It also allowed researchers to observe the penguins’ departures to and arrivals from their foraging journeys, as well as their dangerous interactions with leopard seals and killer whales.
 
Featuring original color photographs and complemented with online videos, Journeys with Emperors is both an eye-opening overview of the emperor penguin’s life and a thrilling tale of scientific discovery in one of the most remote, harsh, and beautiful places on Earth.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Release date: Nov 29, 2023
• ISBN: 9780226824390

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Cover Page for Journeys with Emperors

Journeys with Emperors

Journeys with Emperors

Tracking the World’s Most Extreme Penguin

Gerald L. Kooyman and Jim Mastro

Foreword by Jessica Ulrika Meir

The University of Chicago Press

CHICAGO LONDON

The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637

The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London

© 2023 by Gerald L. Kooyman and Jim Mastro

Foreword © 2023 by Jessica Ulrika Meir

All photos and images by G. Kooyman, except where otherwise indicated

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews. For more information, contact the University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637.

Published 2023

Printed in the United States of America

32 31 30 29 28 27 26 25 24 23     1 2 3 4 5

ISBN-13: 978-0-226-82438-3 (cloth)

ISBN-13: 978-0-226-82439-0 (e-book)

DOI: https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/ 9780226824390.001.0001

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Kooyman, Gerald L., author. | Mastro, Jim, 1953– author.

Title: Journeys with emperors : tracking the world’s most extreme penguin / Gerald L. Kooyman and Jim Mastro.

Description: Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 2023. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2023006617 | ISBN 9780226824383 (cloth) | ISBN 9780226824390 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Emperor penguin—Antarctica. | Emperor penguin—Behavior.

Classification: LCC QL696.S473 K658 2023 | DDC 598.4709989—dc23/eng/20230223

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023006617

This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper).

To my wife, Melba, who has experienced every polar and elsewhere expedition, read and proofread every word of most journal papers as well as this book, and raised two boys as a single, working mom while I was in absentia in the field; and to those two boys, Carsten and Tory, who until they were skilled enough to go into the field, were without their father much of the time.

Jerry Kooyman

To my coauthor, Jerry Kooyman, consummate scientist and dear friend, whose scientific rigor and creativity forever changed marine biology, and whose curiosity and passion about the natural world and the animals that inhabit it are a constant source of inspiration to me.

Jim Mastro

Figure F.1. The bathymetry of the Ross Sea.

Contents

Foreword

Preface

CHAPTER 1  A Meeting with Emperor Penguins

CHAPTER 2  The Kings of Saint Andrews Bay

CHAPTER 3  The Seven Colonies of the Ross Sea

CHAPTER 4  The Emperors of Cape Washington

CHAPTER 5  Kings and Emperors in One Year

CHAPTER 6  The Commuter Journey

CHAPTER 7  The Fledging Journey

CHAPTER 8  The Pre-molt Journey

CHAPTER 9  The Post-molt Journey

CHAPTER 10  How Do They Do It?

CHAPTER 11  Predator as Prey

CHAPTER 12  Climate, Conservation, and Consumption

Plates

Acknowledgments

Annotated Bibliography

Index

Foreword

Hearing the stories of early Antarctic exploration and research, or of the origins of human spaceflight, I have at times felt I was born in the wrong era. There was so much to truly explore, so many things untouched, untested, unknown, and so many wonders yet to behold both on and off our planet. Although I would not have had the same opportunities to explore at that time as I have had throughout my career on the ice (the locals’ term for living and working in the Antarctic) and in space, I still fondly imagine those early days. Perhaps it all works out for a reason, with still-countless discoveries to be made by scientists of all backgrounds and genders, on Earth and beyond.

The early decades of Antarctic research were truly a different time—more pure, wilder, with scientific processes and methods unmarred by countless safety constraints and limitations, rules and regulations. It was a time when true pioneers like Jerry Kooyman embarked on the frozen unknown of Antarctica, armed with only their burning scientific questions, and absolutely no one’s comparable experience to draw from. A time when sticks of dynamite were handed to willing scientists with no background in explosives (yes, this was one of Jerry’s exploits, even if it isn’t recounted in the pages to follow!), and by some grace you left the ice with not only your data but all your fingers and toes.

There are striking similarities to this paradigm in the world of human space exploration, as we embarked on our initial journey to the moon in this same period. The NASA of today, burdened by the federal weight of bureaucracy and its required boards, meetings, and approval processes, would have been unrecognizable to the army of fresh young engineers making executive-level decisions on an hourly basis as we succeeded in meeting President John F. Kennedy’s bold proclamation of setting foot on the moon.

Both in space and on the ice, it was a time of unbridled, raw exploration. Those that were fortunate enough to play a role made immense contributions, blazing the trail for others to follow. Jerry was undoubtedly at the head of this pack. In addition to being a true explorer, he is a bona fide naturalist. His research and pursuits have not only sought answers for hypothesis-driven research but also served to unravel the natural-history mysteries of the organisms he has studied.

In this book, Jerry recounts his tale of one of the most iconic examples of charismatic megafauna in a way that captures both the magnitude of his science and the elegant descriptions and personal anecdotes that transport the reader to the ice (all through the lens of a changing climate). His acts of veritable heroism—raging-river crossings, risky glacial traverses, frequent excursions on figurative and literal thin ice—were simply routine components of his daily scientific procedures. And although such operations were inconceivable during my time in Antarctica four decades later, one cannot deny that a share of the adventure has been lost along with those freedoms from regulation.

Jerry is not only a scientist, naturalist, and explorer; he is also an inventor. To him, it seems a simple endeavor to whittle, tinker, or create something new out of thin air that will be used precisely for its intended porpoise. During his initial research, one could not just open a catalog of wildlife recorders to measure the parameters they are designed to study. When Jerry sought to reveal the impressive depths and durations of the consummate divers, his first step was to design and build his own recording system. I’ve yet to find a more creative use for a kitchen timer! And though he is a pioneer of many first achievements, Jerry would never bring this up himself, for he is among the most humble scientists of his caliber.

There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot. Jerry opens chapter 1 of this book with this telling quote from Aldo Leopold. Like Jerry, from the time I was a young child I possessed a curiosity about the world around me, yearning to experience and understand more about the natural wonders of the planet. This scientific curiosity evolved into a theme of exploration that has guided and driven me throughout my life. Plunging under the Antarctic ice to research the diving physiology of emperor penguins was an academic endeavor inspired by original explorers and true galvanizers like Jerry. Continuing my work on animals in extreme environments eventually led to my ultimate career goal of conducting literal out-of-this-world science while gazing down on our home planet from up above. If you’ve picked up this book, my assumption is that you too are already someone who cannot live without wild things . . . My expectation is that Jerry’s stories will tie you even more deeply to that wild.

The man, the myth, the legend—not just a casually blurted title but the actual words I use to define Jerry. Yet I’d be remiss if I didn’t add the term mentor. The stimulating conversations, advice, and stories recounted to me by Jerry and the adventures we shared during my years studying at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography are among my most-cherished memories. They were pivotal in shaping my academic foundation and the course of my future trajectory, as is the case for countless others whose lives Jerry has graced. I commend Jerry—and Jim Mastro—for this latest pursuit in capturing his life’s adventures and communicating them with the world. Those of us fortunate enough to have led such a profound life, be it on or off this planet, understand that these adventures and experiences are not ours alone. We explore on behalf of all humanity, and thus it is our responsibility to relay our insights, to share them with all humankind, and if you’re lucky enough, to blaze as wide a trail as Jerry.

Jessica Ulrika Meir, PhD

Comparative physiologist and NASA astronaut

Preface

The emperor penguin was probably first seen in 1820, in loose pack ice somewhere north of the Ross Sea, by the Russian explorer Thaddeus von Bellingshausen during his circumnavigation of the Antarctic Continent. However, during British explorer James Cook’s second expedition (1772–1775), when he was searching (unsuccessfully) for Terra Australis Incognita (the unknown southern land), the father-and-son German naturalists Johann Reinhold Forster and Johann Georg Adam Forster described a bird that may have been an emperor, thus their designation as Aptenodytes forsteri in Gray’s 1844 naming of the species.

These remarkable birds have several unique characteristics that set them apart from all other penguins: (1) they are the largest penguin; (2) they are the only golden-breasted penguin; (3) they spend their entire life either in the sea or on sea ice; (4) they breed and incubate their eggs in the dead of winter (the Fjordland crested penguin does this, too, but under significantly less-harsh conditions); (5) males do all the incubation; (6) the male’s 120-day fast is the longest of any penguin, and perhaps of any bird; (7) at the highest latitudes, breeding and incubation are done entirely in the dark, without building a nest, while exposed to fierce Antarctic weather; (8) they are not territorial, and the males rely on huddling with each other to get through the long winter night; (9) when they walk as a group, they walk in single file; and (10) they are the only penguin that walks with its wings pressed against its sides instead of holding them out for balance.

While their standing height is just under a meter in normal posture, they can extend their necks about another 10 centimeters to get a look above the crowd. Their massive feet provide a thermal barrier between their body’s hot core and the sea ice on which they stand. Indeed, those remarkable feet have many roles. The claws are the main propulsive grip when scooting along on their stomachs (a process called tobogganing), and their feet serve as a brake and rudder while swimming. They also function as a mobile nest for the egg and chick during incubation and brooding. Shielded by the feet from the life-threatening, intense cold of the ice and protected from the elements by the brood-pouch feathers, the egg or chick is maintained at about 38°C (100°F) while the air and ice temperature just one to three centimeters away can be −50°C (−58°F) or lower. When the penguins rock back on their heels, a small, thick, quarter-sized pad is the only skin touching the ice, and within this heel pad are air-filled cells that provide insulation for the blood circulating through the foot.

In short, the emperor penguin is supremely adapted to its environment. And no wonder: penguins have been around since they diverged from loons in the late Cretaceous, and the emperor itself has been around for 2.5 million years, only slightly less than the Adélie penguin (Pygoscelis adeliae). I find it fascinating that the two oldest penguin species are also the only ones that breed so far south.

Of course, even Adélies vacate the premises when winter arrives. The emperor males stay on, incubating eggs in bone-chilling temperatures, hurricane-force winds, and total darkness—the harshest of all possible physical conditions for any higher vertebrate. It is therefore not surprising that the first breeding location for such a large, beautiful, and abundant animal wasn’t discovered until 1902, by members of Robert Falcon Scott’s 1901–1904 Discovery Expedition. The colony was at Cape Crozier, on the opposite side of the island from Scott’s base at Winter Quarters Bay.

During Scott’s subsequent 1910–1913 Terra Nova Expedition, three members of his crew—Edward A. Wilson, Apsley Cherry-Garrard, and Henry R. Birdie Bowers—made the winter journey from their base at Cape Evans (on the western coast of Ross Island) to Cape Crozier in order to collect eggs for a scientific study on embryology. Cherry-Garrard chronicled that trip in his book The Worst Journey in the World. And indeed it was. The three men braved brutal temperatures, privation, and extreme discomfort—literally skating on the edge of death—in conditions the penguins endure routinely.

The fact that the penguins can do this and questions about how they do it have been the focus of multiple scientific studies. Members of Scott’s Discovery Expedition were the first to realize the birds were incubating eggs during the winter, but the first scientific research on this behavior didn’t take place until a man named Bernard Stonehouse conducted studies at Dion Islands (incidentally the most northerly of emperor penguin colonies) during the winters of 1948 and 1949. He was followed by the French biologist Jean Prévost, who in 1952 began his study of emperors at the Pointe Géologie colony, just a few hundred meters from what was later to become the French research base Dumont d’Urville.

Stonehouse’s study was the more heroic of the two early works, and perhaps the most physically challenging of any study on penguins. He was originally in the Antarctic as a copilot for the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) at Stonington Island, but a plane crash and total destruction of the aircraft put an end to that. After several days, he and the pilot were spotted and rescued by a reconnaissance plane from the Ronne Antarctic Research Expedition of 1947–1948.

Following their rescue (which I heard about decades later from Finn Ronne’s wife, Edith), Stonehouse and three companions made a short visit to the Dion Islands by dogsled, in October. He was forced to withdraw soon after to the Stonington Island base, because of deteriorating ice. I imagine he thought it would have been too embarrassing if the Americans had to rescue him again, especially since there was a bit of rivalry between the BAS and Ronne expeditions at the time. However, he was intrigued by the birds and was determined to study them. His only choice was to do the work in the winter, when the sea ice was secure. So in June he and two companions once again dogsledded back to the colony and remained until mid-August.

And that is what is defined as a hardcore polar expedition.

At the time of his study, only two other emperor penguin colonies were known: the one at Cape Crozier and another at Haswell Island, which was discovered by members of Douglas Mawson’s Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1911–1914. The colony at Pointe Géologie was discovered in 1950, and by the time Prévost had published his description of emperor breeding behavior in 1961 (coincidentally, the same year as my first trip to Antarctica), eight more colonies had been discovered, including one at Coulman Island, in the Ross Sea. (I learned about this colony later in my 1961 trip but never dreamed that one day I would visit it in the course of my research.)

Prévost’s work was the start of the longest-term and most productive ecological, behavioral, and physiological emperor penguin research program, but it ended abruptly in 2008, when the French government imposed restrictions on handling the birds.

There have been, of course, numerous other studies of emperor penguin breeding behavior and physiology in the years since Stonehouse and Prévost conducted theirs, and what the emperor males do during the winter is now well established. But what about the rest of the year? As crucial as successful egg incubation is to emperor penguin survival, there is much more to their story. In my research, I have found that their lives are marked by four critical journeys: the chick-feeding (commuter) journey, the fledging journey, the pre-molt journey, and the post-molt journey.

This book is about those journeys, the hazards the penguins face during each one, and the physiological adaptations that allow them to not only survive but thrive in the harshest and most physiologically challenging environment on Earth. It is also the story of my life and research with emperor penguins, my quest to define the natural history of their annual cycle, my adventures along the way, and my collaboration with many friends, including my two sons, all of whom I have had the privilege of working with on the ice of the Ross Sea.

At several points in the book, I have indicated the availability of a video clip showing the behavior described in the text by including the symbol shown here. You can find and watch these videos by visiting the book’s web page, at https://press.uchicago.edu/sites/kooyman-mastro/index.html.

Breeding

Emperor penguins begin to arrive at their colonies from about mid-March until about mid-April. At Pointe Géologie, where the arrival can be observed from the station, the largest influx occurs from March 30 to April 13. At the end of their long march over 50 to 100 kilometers of sea ice, the birds form a long, thin line, each penguin a uniform distance from the others. At the Ross Sea colonies, where our studies were conducted, this arrival has never been witnessed.

Upon arrival, the males may weigh as much as 45 kilograms, with an average weight of 37 kilograms. The females range up to 32 kilograms, with an average weight of 28 kilograms. This sexual dimorphism has little or nothing to do with male dominance; there is no territorial defense or control of females, though there may be sexual selection by the females. The male needs a large fat store for the long winter fast to which he is committed, and the females may prefer the more robust males. Over the next month, the birds engage in prenuptial behavior and bonding, culminating in the first copulations a month after arrival. Based on data from a few banded birds, few pairs reunite the following year.

Egg laying begins about the first week of May and continues through the first week of June, the exact timing depending on the latitude of the colony. Within twenty-four hours, the female passes the egg to the male and departs the colony to hunt for food over the next two months. The male incubates the egg through the winter, until the female returns to take over in early August (about the time the egg hatches) and the male goes to sea for about three weeks to feed. After that, both members of the pair take turns nurturing the chick and feeding at sea, with their feeding trips getting progressively shorter until the chicks are ready to fledge.

Figure P.1 is a graphic representation of the emperor penguin’s annual cycle. The periods of occurrence and durations are based on my estimates from Cape Washington. They will vary somewhat depending on colony location, especially latitude, as well as on the weather and sea ice conditions in any given year.

Figure P.1. The annual cycle of the emperor penguin. F = fledging (the arrow denotes the approximate duration); M = molt; PM = post-molt travel; B = arrival at the colony and bonding or mate selection; L = egg laying; Pause = the short time that the female may delay departing because of hesitancy to give up the egg and/or the time after the male assumes incubation and the female delays leaving; I = incubation, largely by the male, including the time the female remains nearby before leaving on the post-lay trek, as well as the rest of the time until hatching; Post-Lay Trek = the travel of the female after leaving the colony (this has been determined only by the Australians at Taylor Glacier and Amanda Bay, and possibly at Pointe Géologie); H = Hatching and transfer of the hatchling to the female; B = Brooding, the male broods briefly until the female returns from her trek and assumes the task, then brooding alternates between the male and female through October, with each session of variable duration, depending on the foraging success of each adult; C = crèche (during late September the chicks form crèches, and this continues into November). During both October and November, depending on the weather, both brooding and forming crèches will occur.

Table 0.1. Metric and imperial conversions

[ CHAPTER 1 ]

A Meeting with Emperor Penguins

There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot.

Aldo Leopold

Great Scott, what have I gotten myself into this time?

It was early October 1961, and I was on my first excursion away from McMurdo Station, Antarctica. It seemed as though I was at the frozen edge of the world. The temperature was −30°C (−22°F), and the wind was howling at 60 kilometers per hour. To say I was uncomfortable hardly begins to describe it. Sir Douglas Mawson, the Australian explorer, once said of Antarctica: We had discovered an accursed country. We had found the Home of the Blizzard.

I suppose I couldn’t reasonably compare my situation to the suffering that Mawson experienced. Still, the moisture in my nose was forming ice crystals—a new experience for a young man raised in Southern California who had never made a trip to the snow. Antarctica is the ultimate snow trip, though, so despite my discomfort, I was loving every minute of it.

I was at Cape Royds, on the western side of Ross Island, at the southwestern corner of the Ross Sea. In front of me was McMurdo Sound, the southernmost open body of water in the world (for part of the year). It is bordered by Ross Island on the east, the Antarctic Continent on the west, and the McMurdo Ice Shelf on the south. Behind me loomed 4,000-meter Mount Erebus, one of the tallest mountains in Antarctica and one of the few active volcanoes in the world with an open lava pool. Strong winds called katabatics were sweeping down from the mountain, as they often did, and hammering the sea ice in front of me. With my back to the wind, I was captivated by the