Fossil Finds Trace the History of Penguins (preview)

See Inside

Recent fossil discoveries reveal the surprising evolutionary history of penguins

By R. Ewan Fordyce and Daniel T. Ksepka

Image: FRANS LANTING

In Brief

• Penguins are weird birds in that they cannot fly and are instead proficient swimmers and divers.
• Evolutionary biologists have long wondered how penguins evolved their peculiar traits and how some of their kind conquered the bitterly cold Antarctic.
• Recent fossil discoveries have enabled researchers to piece together the penguins' evolutionary past, revealing that some of the traits that fortify them against the cold evolved under warm conditions.
• Although penguins have triumphed over 60 million years of climate change, current warming conditions may outpace their ability to adapt.

November in Antarctica, and the ice is on the wane. Soon the emperors will go fishing. They'll spend the austral summer gliding through the frigid Southern Ocean, diving to depths of more than 1,500 feet in search of fish, squid and krill to gorge on before making the long trek inland for the winter to breed. When the time comes to haul out, they will launch themselves out of the water back onto the ice. That brief moment between sea and ice is the only time these penguins experience what most birds take for granted: being airborne.

Indeed, emperors and other penguins are bizarre birds. Like all birds, they possess feathers, wings and beaks and lay eggs. But penguins also exhibit a suite of characteristics that readily distinguishes them from their feathered friends. Their wings have evolved into flippers for swimming; their trademark tuxedo camouflages them from predators above and below; their dense bones provide ballast for diving; their short, thick legs steer their body underwater and help give them that endearing (and energetically efficient) waddle on land. Thanks to these traits and others, penguins are masters of the marine realm, and many of their kind?the emperors among them?have managed to conquer one of the most extreme environments on the planet.

This article was originally published with the title The Strangest Bird.

Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=5e9f3530fcd7990555b36707f4b9c956

doug hutchison larry brown thomas kinkade pat summit brewers matt cain adastra