Book Review

MSTM 514: Tourism and Climate Change: Responding to Challenges

Vee Jay C. Dalisay

6-4-2016
INTRODUCTION

Detailing descriptions through the seemingly simplistic cycles of Adlie

penguins, Frasers Penguins: A Journey to the Future in Antarctica provides an
accurate picture of the rapid changes that occur in one of the worlds most
crucial areas, the southern polar region, brought about by climate change.

Published in 2010 by Henry Holt and Co., the book follows the experiences of
the author Fen Montaigne as he worked with the highly regarded ecologist Bill
Frasers field team who studied the Adlie penguins during the Antarctic spring
and summer of 2005-2006. Being highly dependent on the sea ice to survive,
this specific breed of birds is greatly affected by the shift in temperature in the
Antarctic region warming faster than any other place on earth. In the book,
Montaigne describes his fascination of the untamed beauty of Antarctica, the
charming lives of the Adlies and the tale told through Frasers work of how
global warming is swiftly changing this part of the world. With climate change
being a global phenomenon, one cannot help but think how this change is going
to drastically affect the rest of the world.

Frasers Penguins: A Journey to the Future in Antarctica dramatically chronicles

Antarctica's penguins that bears witness to climate changes that foreshadow
our own future.

SUMMARY

For more than thirty years, ecologist, author, and penguin biologist Bill Fraser
has specialized in the study of the Adlie penguins on the Antarctic Peninsula.
During that time, Fraser has experienced firsthand how the warming planet
specifically, the Antarctic region has drastically dwindled the existence of the
Adlie race.

In the austral summer of 2005-2006, his team of scientists was joined by

magazine journalist Fen Montaigne in Palmer Station in Antarctica. There, the
writer stayed for five months doing the work that typical penguin researchers
do weighing and tagging Adlie penguins with radio tags, sifting through
guano in search of silverfish otoliths and observing the birds mating behaviors.

Montaigne was particularly amazed by the sheer beauty of the Antarctic

landscape. Its icy towers, glaciated mountains and iceberg-filled seas virtually
untouched by man evoked a wonderful feeling of thrill and awe. As Fraser
described to him at one point in the book, Its a place where you could still feel
inconsequential. You are part of a working system that paid you no mind.

In Montaignes five months of polar experience and learning from Fraser

himself, he was able to document how the Adlie penguins survived in such a
remarkably hostile environment and how climate change has affected their
plight. To him, the penguins in study are among the toughest creatures in the
world being hardwired to exist in the biting cold of the Antarctic. He
thoughtfully described everything he saw about the penguins and their activities
 their migration, fights for mates and for territories, and dedication to the care
of their new-born chicks.

However, the major conflict discussed in the book is the troubling decline in the
number of Adlie penguins as pointed out by Fraser in his three decades of
observation. Though the population of the penguins is still robust at 5 million or
more spread across the continent's coast, it has dropped more than 80 percent
in the northwestern Antarctic Peninsula in the last 25 years. Even more so, the
scientist noted that the brown skuas, the penguins predators, were also on the
decline. Peculiar activities were also observed among the continents other
inhabitants chinstrap penguins moving in; and the population of fur seals and
leopard seals rising.

The main reason for this is the rising temperature which has made the
environment inhospitable for the Adlies. Montaigne remarks that average
winter temperatures have risen 11 degrees in just 60 years. Higher
temperatures bring more snow, which delays the start of mating and nesting
season, which results in smaller penguin chicks and a higher mortality rate. This
also led to the rapid melting of the Antarctic sea ice. Though the penguins breed
on dry land, they need sea ice to hunt for food. The loss of sea ice diminished
populations of Antarctic krill, the penguins main prey. And, though some
models indicate that it is unlikely all of the ice in Antarctica will melt, the pace
of glacier recession has accelerated in the last decade. With a diminished food
supply and shrinking habitat, the chances of survival for the Adlie penguins
are not very good.

In the end, Fraser told Montaigne that the Adlie penguins have long endured
many challenges, but they are now confronting conditions for which nothing in
their evolutionary history has prepared them, and that they have now reached
their tipping point. On a sad note, the old scientist remarked that the Adlie
colonies will be gone within our lifetime.

ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION

Frasers Penguins is an excellently told albeit a depressing story about

creatures who have perfectly adapted to their habitat yet found themselves
unable to change with their changing environment. In just a matter of 30 years
or so (taking Frasers career as reference), the age-old colony of these enduring
penguins has greatly collapsed a fact that humans should never overlook.

Global warming or more appropriately, climate change, has been a very

contentious issue in the recent years. It has been a subject for debate in
scientific communities and political arenas alike. Furthermore, many of its critics
still seem to deny the existence of this phenomenon. What they do not see is
the glaring truth that global warming is happening right now and not in some far
off future. Frasers Adlie penguins are a testament to this. Even without the
advanced scientific instruments and whatnot, these animals are able to
recognize the adverse effects of the rising temperatures to the worlds coldest
place and their home, Antarctica, as it threatens their very existence. If these
penguins were people, they should be really feeling a sense of doom by now.
Climate change is warming the poles faster than many other places on the
planet, which means that polar scientists are coming to grips with these
changes sooner than most anyone else. The book warns us that whats
happening on the Antarctic Peninsula now is a taste of unsettling changes,
elsewhere, to come. Should the West Antarctic Ice Sheet continue to melt,
global sea levels could rise dramatically, inundating many coastal cities by the
end of this century.

As a person who is not very well versed in the scientific study of global warming,
much less in the study of penguins, the book was a lot to take in for me at first.
Nevertheless, Montaignes narrative combining both poetic description and
scientific discussions helped me a lot to understand it with greater ease. His
writing was careful and clear in such a way that it provides a clear picture of
scientific processes even to non-scientific readers like me. Notwithstanding
this, the author has also brought his readers to the grandeur of the Antarctic
region through his wonderful storytelling. His vivid description of the polar
region captivates the readers as if what he was writing was fiction. The way that
Montaigne wove both science and literary work together resulted to a very
affective narration of what is really happening in our world today.

As for Fraser, I admire his full dedication to his work. Judging from Montaignes
accounts of him, he may be seen as a man who is happiest away from
civilization. Hed rather spend long hours or months, for that matter alone in
such hostile environments. Conversely, his contribution to the study of penguins
specifically and of the environmental changes happening in the polar region in
general are an indispensable evidence of a likely future that we are going to
have.

Upon finishing the book, a sense of dread may be felt as regards to the way we
view climate change. Antarctica has, for ages, remained far from the grasps of
human exploitation yet we see now that the long carbonic reach of industrialized
societies is quickly wiping out one of its toughest creatures. Lastly, despite the
dread that the book Frasers Penguins overtones, I still cannot help but feel
inspired not only by the remarkable Adlies, but of the terribly awesome
landscape they inhabit and the scientists who have dedicated their whole lives
apart from civilization just to understand them as well.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION

In conclusion, Frasers Penguins: A Journey to the Future in Antarctica is a very

informative piece that combines personal experiences with thorough research
on penguins and climate change two seemingly different subjects connected
by the frozen world that is Antarctica. It provides a tangible proof of what is
currently happening because of the continuous rise in the earths temperature
and a glimpse of what could happen to the rest of the world if climate change
is kept unchecked.

Finally, I recommend this book to those who would like to enlighten themselves
about climate change as it happens today, and study more about the subject.
And of course, it is recommended for those who love penguins.