Fishing ban rescues Robben Island penguin chicks

Fish feast boosts penguin numbers

Date: July 7, 2015

Source: University of Exeter

Summary: Survival of endangered African penguin chicks increased by 18 percent following a trial three-year fishery closure around Robben Island in South Africa, a new study has found.

The results, which are published in the Royal Society JournalBiology Letters, indicate that even small 'no-take zones' can dramatically improve the survival chances of endangered species.

The African penguin population is in freefall, with adult survival rates over the last decade desperately low. Although the ban on commercial fishing off Robben Island has boosted chick survival, the long term prospect for the species remains gloomy.

Dr Richard Sherley from the University of Exeter said: "One of the major challenges of conserving a mobile species like the African penguin is that once they leave a protected area they are subject to outside pressures and dangers, including poor prey availability.

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African penguins put researchers in a flap

Controlled fishing experiment raises controversy over cause of birds’ decline on Robben Island.

Michael Cherry

15 October 2014

Robben Island is notorious as the site where Nelson Mandela spent 18 years in prison, but now the island’s 1,200 breeding pairs of African penguins are sparking a scientific controversy. At stake is the survival of an endangered species, as well as how fisheries around the world are managed.

In 2013, there were just 22,000 breeding pairs of African penguins (Spheniscus demersus) worldwide: the population had declined by 65% since 2001. Possible causes include pollution, habitat loss and climate change, but a key suspect is fishing of anchovies and sardines, which are important prey for penguins.

To test this theory, in 2008, the now-defunct South African Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism began an unusual experiment involving two pairs of islands: Robben and Dassen islands, off South Africa’s west coast; and St Croix and Bird islands, off the country’s south coast. For three years, a zone around one island in each pair was closed to fishing while the other island remained open. Then the situation was reversed. The rare controlled experiment has “important implications for fisheries worldwide in competition with vertebrate predators”, including seabirds, seals and dolphins, says Johann Augustyn, secretary of the South African Deep-Sea Trawling Industry Association in Cape Town.

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