What a penguin chick taught a Pierce County teacher about climate and hope
The smoke is gone, thankfully, though wildfires continue to burn in a few western states.
For more than a week late this summer, a massive plume of smoke from out-of-control wildfires squatted on the West Coast. The air was dangerous to breathe where we live in Steilacoom. It was an eerie and disturbing time in a year of catastrophes.
In the final scene of “King Lear,” Shakespeare asks, “Is this the promis’d end? Or image of that horror?” I heard people using terms like “Armageddon” and “apocalypse.” With what we’ve been through lately, the language did not feel like hyperbole.
A relentless pandemic, a record numbers of hurricanes, five straight years of record-setting temperatures and the conflagration in the West are all signs of a planet in peril.
Nature is calling to us. It’s especially troubling that so many refuse to see or hear what is increasingly evident about our changing climate. The willful refusal to listen to the science feels like we’re living in our own version of the Dark Ages.
My wife Susan and I recently completed a quest to see every one of the world’s 18 species of penguin. It took us 17 years and extensive travels to some of the wildest and most beautiful places on earth.
We learned a lot from penguins. One emperor penguin chick offered two lessons for dealing with the possibility of a climate-change apocalypse.
The first lesson is, certainly, to prevent it.
I was sitting on the ice next an emperor penguin colony. A chick walked right up to me, barely a foot away. I thought it was going to climb onto my lap. It looked right at me.
I looked back at it and realized the first imperative of prevention must be to face facts.
Dr. Dee Boersma is a renowned penguin biologist at the University of Washington. She calls penguins “marine sentinels.” They are health indicators for the oceans and the planet.
People love penguins, but they don’t realize how endangered they are. Of the 18 species, 11 are declining in population,and 10 are already listed as endangered. As oceans warm and ice melts, biologists expect more species to find themselves on the endangered list.
Emperor penguins, like this chick, are especially dependent on ice. They are hatched on ice. Their main food, krill, depends on ice. Weakened by warming ocean waters, two ice sheets the size of Great Britain and Florida are breaking up in Antarctica.
The emperor penguin chick face steep population declines in the next few decades.
These chicks are unbelievably cute. Their gray-plush bodies look like they’re wearing pajamas. Their big eyes are sweet and curious. They may be the cutest animal babies in the world.
The cute factor is one reason everyone loves penguins. They are living lessons in a deepening love for the planet and its creatures, in all their beauty and vulnerability.
We can all help penguins and the planet by voting, volunteering, supporting science and fact-based policy recommendations, and, of course, trying to live more sustainably..
Because if we can’t save penguins — cannot save what everybody loves — what can we save?
The second lesson is to resist despair. You cannot sit beside an emperor penguin colony without feeling an amazing mix of emotions: awe, wonder and hope.
Consider the circumstances of this astonishing little penguin’s life. Emperor penguins remain in Antarctica year-round, the only creatures to do so. They are also the only creatures to have their babies in an Antarctic winter.
They baby is hatched in the most ferocious winters on the planet. Temperatures are regularly -50˚F. Winds reach 100 mph. The emperor chick beside me is one of the most improbable and inspiring creatures alive.
In the dark times we find ourselves living through, emperor penguin chicks entertain and console us. They also inspire us with a positive image of hope, toughness and courage in their ability to survive in the most daunting conditions on the planet.
Charles Bergman is an emeritus professor at Pacific Lutheran University in Parkland. He has published widely on wildlife and conservation issues in National Geographic, Smithsonian and other publications. His latest book is “Every Penguin in the World: A Quest to See Them All. “