​Scientists Find New Penguins Colonies in Antarctica

Scientists Find New Penguins Colonies in Antarctica

科学家在南极洲发现新的企鹅群落

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　　By Faith Pirlo

　　28 January 2024

　　Scientists have found four groups of emperor penguins in Antarctica that they did not know about before. These groups, called "colonies," were found with new satellite images.

　　Emperor penguins are the world's largest penguins, sea birds that cannot fly but that swim. They are consider "near threatened." This means the animals might have reduced numbers or live in fewer areas than before.

　　The penguins raise their babies, called chicks, during the Antarctic winter on areas of frozen sea ice. If the ice breaks up before the chicks grow up, many of the chicks might die.

　　Recently released research says that some of the penguins are moving away from their old colonies.

　　Peter Fretwell is a researcher at the British Antarctic Survey, a government organization. He said that conditions at one colony had become more dangerous since 2016. As a result, the colony near Halley Bay seems to have moved about 30 kilometers east.

　　He said, "Emperor penguins have taken it upon themselves to try to find more stable sea ice."

　　Fretwell said that the four new colonies have likely existed for years, but scientists have just recently seen them. They are small colonies with less than 1000 pairs of penguins, Fretwell said.

　　Scientists have identified 66 emperor penguin colonies and fewer than 300,000 breeding pairs. The four newly found colonies do not change population estimates for the birds very much. However, Fretwell said the fact that one of the colonies moved helps scientists to understand where the birds are going.

　　Daniel Zitterbart is a penguin researcher at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in the U.S. eastern state of Massachusetts. He was not involved in the study of the newly found penguins. But he said that it is unclear if the new groups broke away from the larger colonies.

　　Zitterbart said that the places where the penguins reproduce are changing and that, as the world warms, more "penguins will be on the move."

　　I'm Faith Pirlo.

　　Christina Larson reported this story for the Associated Press. Faith Pirlo adapted it for VOA Learning English.

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　　作者：Faith Pirlo

　　2024年1月28日

　　科学家们在南极洲发现了四群以前未知的帝企鹅。这些群体，被称为"群落"，是通过新的卫星图像发现的。

　　帝企鹅是世界上最大的企鹅，是不能飞行但会游泳的海鸟。它们被认为是"近危"物种。这意味着这些动物的数量可能会减少，或者生活的区域比以前少。

　　企鹅在南极的冬天在冻结的海冰上抚养它们的孩子，也就是小企鹅。如果冰在小企鹅长大之前破裂，许多小企鹅可能会死亡。

　　最近发布的研究表明，一些企鹅正在离开他们的旧群落。

　　Peter Fretwell是英国南极调查局的一名研究员，这是一个政府机构。他说，自2016年以来，一个群落的环境变得更加危险。因此，哈雷湾附近的群落似乎已经向东移动了大约30公里。

　　他说："帝企鹅自己尝试寻找更稳定的海冰。"

　　Fretwell说，这四个新群落可能已经存在了多年，但科学家们直到最近才看到它们。他说，这些是小群落，每个群落的企鹅对数少于1000对。

　　科学家们已经发现了66个帝企鹅群落和不到300,000对繁殖对。这四个新发现的群落对鸟类的人口估计影响不大。然而，Fretwell说，一个群落的移动有助于科学家了解这些鸟类的去向。

　　Daniel Zitterbart是美国马萨诸塞州东部伍兹霍尔海洋研究所的一名企鹅研究员。他并未参与新发现的企鹅的研究。但他说，新群体是否从大群落中分离出来还不清楚。

　　Zitterbart说，企鹅繁殖的地方正在改变，随着世界变暖，更多的"企鹅将会迁徙"。

　　我是Faith Pirlo。

　　这个故事是由美联社的Christina Larson报道的，Faith Pirlo为VOA学习英语改编了它。

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　　这个故事中的词汇

　　colonies – n. 群落，一群在同一地点生活或生长的植物或动物

　　stable – adj. 稳定的，保持不变的

　　pair – n. 一对，两个

　　breed – v. 繁殖，产生并抚养后代

　　reproduce – v. 繁殖，通过性繁殖产生后代