Project Updates: If you would like to learn more about what is currently happening with the Penguin Project, send us an e-mail and ask to be added to our list to receive updates about the project.
June 28, 2011 Dee Boersma Interviewed in "Advance"
According to a Brazilian newspaper, 75 dead penguins have been found off the coast of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. A biologist with the Centre for Coastal Studies, limnology and marine (CECLIMA) said it's common this time of year to find dead penguins on the shore. Usually, the penguins are juveniles who starved. However, since last Friday, there has been an oil event, leading to contamination of birds and higher than usual mortality.
June 8, 2011 600 Dead Magellanics Ashore in Uruguay
The AP reports that 600 dead Magellanic penguins have washed up ashore in Uruguay since June 4. Dead turtles, dolphins and albatrosses were also found washed ashore with the penguins. Experts are still trying to determine the cause.
May 23, 2011 Update on Nightingale Oil Spill
The Tristan da Cunha website has lots of great photos and updates about the rehabilitation efforts of oiled Rockhopper penguins on Nightingale Island. Go take a look!
May 12, 2011 World Migratory Bird Day Coming Up!
May 14-15, 2011 is World Migratory Bird Day and this year's theme is "Land Use Changes from a Bird’s-Eye View." You can find more information at World Migratory Bird Day's website.
May 2, 2011 Dee Boersma Interviewed on BirdNote
Listen to Dee Boersma talk about Galapagos penguins and the "condos" she built for them on NPR's BirdNote.
April 29, 2011 Six-year-old Fights Cancer and Helps Penguins
Aghelos Kouvaras, 6, has Burkitt's lymphoma, a rare form of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. While in the hospital receiving treatment, he read about penguins and became determined to help them. As he puts it, "They're cute animals and they were dying." What a succinct way to say it! Through the Wildlife Conservation's Run for the Wild benefit run, Aghelos raised money to help Magellanic Penguins at Punta Tombo. Read the full story.
April 14, 2011 More Media Converage of Feather-Loss Disorder
April 8, 2011 Feather-loss disorder at Punta Tombo
Discovery reports on a new disease affecting penguins at Punta Tombo. Read the article.
March 23, 2011 Dee Boersma in a WCS video
WCS has uploaded a video of Dee Boersma talking about penguins and why we need them as much as they need us. Go watch the video!
March 9, 2011 New Argentine National Park Protects Penguins
Monte Leon is Argentina's newest national park. The former sheep ranch was purchased in 2001 through a donation made by Kristine Tompkins, the ex-CEO of the Patagonia outdoor clothing company who is working with her husband, Doug Tompkins, to create vast swaths of conservation areas in both Chilean and Argentine Patagonia. Read an account of a visit to the park.
February 23, 2011 Science Reports on Flipper Bands
Science magazine comments on the recent paper in Nature determining that flipper bands harm penguins. Science mentions, "It is unclear whether the bands are equally harmful to other species of penguin." The full article can be found here.
February 8, 2011 Cute Penguin Cartoons
Some fun --and educational-- cartoons about human impacts on penguins. Dee Boersma makes a cameo!
January 12, 2011 Dee Boersma Counters Paper Denouncing Flipper Bands
A recent paper in Nature contends that flipper bands are harmful to penguins and lead to unreliable data. Dr. Boersma is quoted on NPR questioning the study's conclusions. You can read the NPR piece here and the original Nature paper here.
October 27, 2010 Marine Protected Areas in Argentina Awarded
WWF awarded its "Leaders for a Living Planet" to Dr. Patricia Gandini, Argentina’s National Park Administration President, for her conservation efforts in the establishment of four new marine protected areas (MPA). Currently, less than one percent of Argentina's waters are protected. The four new MPAs will increase the area of protection to 10%. The Penguin Project is especially proud of Dr. Gandini as Dr. Boersma was her PhD advisor! Read more about the award and the conservation plans at the WWF site.
October 19, 2010 "Condos" for Penguins
Dee Boersma is behind the effort to build nests with the lava of the Galápagos Islands in order to increase the population of the endangered Galápagos penguin species. The project was funded by the Packard Foundation and in collaboration with the Galapagos National Park. Read the MSNBC article.
September 15, 2010 Explore the GPS Website!
The Global Penguin Society recently unveiled its website. The site is in both English and Spanish, and has stunning visuals, as well as plenty of news and information on penguin conservation. Visit the site at www.globalpenguinsociety.org
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September 15, 2010 Update on Oiled Penguins
The number of oiled Magellanic penguins is more than 140, including 11 penguins that have died. Read the full article.
September 9, 2010 Oiled Penguins Found Off Chubut Coast
Oiled Magellanic penguins are appearing off the coast of Chubut, including at Punta Tombo. So far, about 20 oiled penguins have been seen in Patagonia. Read the full article.
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September 8, 2010 African Penguins Also at Risk of Extinction
More sad news that penguins around the world are threatened. Popi Garcia-Borboroglu is quoted in this article in the Boston Globe.
September 3, 2010 Emperor Penguins Extinct by the End of This Century?
Scientists at the International Penguin Conference report dire results that Emperors could die out within the century. Read the article detailing the findings. (Note, the article is in Dutch, but you can use Google translate to read an English version.)
August 30, 2010 7th International Penguin Conference
Several Boersma Lab members are attending the International Penguin Conference in Boston this week and presenting papers. A public event will be held Wednesday evening, and Dr. Boersma will give a lecture on "Penguins as Sentinels." Details can be found at http://www.penguinconference.org.
August 2, 2010 Anchovy: A Meal In Itself
Watch Prof. Boersma's latest film on the anchovy industry and its impact on seabirds:
July 21, 2010 Hundreds of Dead Penguins in Brazil
The BBC reports that about five hundred penguins have been washed up dead on the beaches of Brazil. Read the article.
June 29, 2010 Boersma on the Controversial Calgary Zoo
Dr. Boersma was called upon to comment on the Calgary's Zoo much-criticized new penguin exhibit. Read the article.
May 19, 2010 Ideas Worth Spreading
Dee Boersma's Mission Blue talk has just been posted on the TED website. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design and its slogan is "Ideas worth spreading."
Watch a video of Dee Boersma spreading the idea that we have to pay attention to the penguins:
Pablo García Borboroglu (aka Popi) is one of the eight 2010 Whitley Award winners. He was presented with the award by Princess Anne in London on May 12. Read an article about the event, in the original Spanish or the translated English.
Watch a video of his work, narrated by Planet Earth's David Attenborough!
April 29, 2010 Ambassador of Penguins
Pablo García Borboroglu, a partner and good friend of the Penguin Sentinels, is one of the finalists for the prestigious Whitley Award. Read the translated article or the original in Spanish.
The Whitley Awards were "developed to recognise conservation leaders from around the world who are applying sustained effort to conserve the natural environment," according to their website.
April 12, 2010 Penguin Park
The Wildlife Conservation Society has successfully secured 650 square miles of Argentine coastline for the "Penguin Island Marine Park." This preserve will protect the country's only colony of Rockhopper penguins, which have seen a rapid decline in recent decades. Read the entire article here: Happy Feet: WCS Agreement Protects Argentine Penguins
April 6, 2010 Technology at Tombo
Starting with the 2010-11 season, the Penguin Project will use hand-held Trimble computers designed especially for rugged outdoor use. The software we'll use to collect data in the field is called Touch Inspect. We were recently highlighted by the developers, Mobile Epiphany, in a press release. Read about our leap into the 21st century: Biologists in Argentina to Study Penguins Using Touch Inspect.
March 31, 2010 Dee Boersma, Filmmaker
Dee Boersma just returned from New Zealand, where she was on a Fulbright to learn wildlife videography. View her first video, about the dangers facing frogs:
February 10, 2010 Nightline interviews Dee Boersma
ABC's Nightline aired a segment on Dr. Boersma and Punta Tombo. Watch the entire clip here:
Coincidentally, the latest issue of the Journal of Field Ornithology includes two papers by Boersma Lab members. Prof. Dee Boersma and Ginger Rebstock find that "Flipper bands do not affect foraging-trip duration of Magellanic Penguins" and Jack Cerchiara is a co-author on a paper looking at Storm Petrels. See our Publications section under the Research tab for other publications.
November 24, 2009 Penguin Pressure
Dee Boersma and Pablo García-Borboroglu talk about the pressures facing penguins today in the Washington Post in the article "Pressures prey on penguins". Be sure to check out the gorgeous photo gallery as well.
October 7, 2009 EarthSky interviews Dee Boersma on penguins as ocean sentinels
Listen to the interview or read the transcript at EarthSky.
September 15, 2009 Dee Boersma wins Heinz Award
Dee Boersma is among 10 recipients of the Heinz Family Foundation awards given to people whose achievements have fostered a cleaner, greener and more sustainable world.
Each recipient will receive $100,000 and a medallion inscribed with the image of the late Sen. John Heinz, R-Pa., whose environmental legacy is commemorated by the awards.
Boersma, a UW biology professor and holder of the Wadsworth Endowed Chair in Conservation Science, is being honored for her extensive field study of penguins and other sea birds to promote conservation and understanding human impact on marine environments. In an effort to better communicate issues of the natural world to the public, she launched Conservation Magazine, a publication for cutting-edge science and smarter conservation (www.conservationmagazine.org). For more than 25 years, she and her students, working with the Wildlife Conservation Society, have studied Magellanic penguins at the Punta Tombo reserve in Argentina. She has dubbed the penguins "marine sentinels" for their warning signs about the ocean environment. Her recent work has shown that, because of climate change and other factors, during the critical period of egg incubation, the penguins at Punta Tombo must swim an average of 25 miles further in search of food than they did just 10 years ago.
The awards, announced Sept. 15, were established in 1993 to honor Heinz's legacy on environmental issues.
August 19, 2009 Penguin Sentinels Researcher Recommends Marine Reserve
In a recently published paper, graduate student Elizabeth Skewgar recommends a marine reserve at Puñihuil Islands, southern Chile, the only known breeding colony where Magellanic and Humboldt penguins nest together. Read the abstract. The paper is published in Ocean & Coastal Management.
June 26, 2009 From Penning Articles to Penguin Wrangling
A former Northwest Asian Weekly editor, El Lee, writes about her life-altering experience of leaving her editorial post behind to research penguins in Patagonia with the Magellanic Penguin Project. Read the article
June 05, 2009 The Magellanic Penguins of Punta Tombo
A graduate student, Eric Wagner, who spent the entire 2008-09 season in Argentina recorded his adventures diligently as he experienced the wonder that is Punta Tombo. He shared several of these entries with Smithsonian Magazine. Read Eric's Penguin Dispatches
May 28, 2009 2009 Spring UPDATE
Hello, Penguin Fans -
The 2009 Spring update is here! Learn how the 2008-09 season went and what is new at the Penguin Project. You can find all of our newsletters, including this most recent one, under 'Publications'. Additionally, Turbo is now on Facebook, so make sure to search for 'Turbo the Penguin' and add yourself as a fan to see exciting pictures, videos and stories all about Turbo!
Warm Regards, Dee
May 17, 2009 Los Pingüinos en la Extinción
Los derrames de petróleo, los cambios climáticos y la contaminación crónica, son las causas principales de la muerte de estas aves marítimas. Dos especialistas que residen en Punta Tombo, la colonia más grande del mundo, cuentan cómo trabajar su preservación es ayudar a la humanidad. Lea la historia completa
May 02, 2009 Deadly Disease Kills 1,380 Magellanic Penguins
Results are in for the previously unknown cause of 1,380 Magellanic penguins that died along the Chilean coast last March. Fowl cholera, caused by a deadly bacterium,was determined to be the causitive agent. It is still unknown as to why the outbreak occured. Read the complete news story
April 30, 2009 New Humboldt Penguin Exhibit Opening at the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle
The anxiously awaited 6.5 million dollar Humboldt exhibit at Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle, WA, is set to open Saturday, May 2. The exhibit is modeled after Humboldt-inhabited coasts of Peru. Read the complete news story
April 04, 2009 Center for Penguins as Ocean Sentinels
On April 4th, 2009, the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Washington and Dr. Boersma announced the launch of the Center for Penguins as Ocean Sentinels. Read more about the new center.
April 01, 2009 The New York Times Interviews the Jane Goodall of Penguins, Dr. Dee Boersma
The New York Times queries Dr. Dee Boersma about how she began her 25 year-long study on penguins, why the penguin population is declining and what policy implications her work will have. Read the complete news story
