The management strategy for the Antarctic krill ( Euphausia superba ) fishery is being revised. A key aim is to spatially and temporally allocate catches in a manner that minimizes impacts to both the krill stock and dependent predators. This process requires spatial information on the distribution and abundance of krill, yet gaps exist for an important fishing area surrounding the South Orkney Islands in the south Scotia Sea....

Biodiversity is critical for maintaining ecosystem function but is threatened by increasing anthropogenic pressures. In the Southern Ocean, a highly biologically productive region containing many endemic species, proactive management is urgently needed to mitigate increasing pressures from fishing, climate change, and tourism. Site‐based conservation is one important tool for managing the negative impacts of human activities o...

We consider how the ongoing recovery of baleen whale populations requires improved understanding when managing the largest commercial fishery in the Southern Ocean, the fishery for Antarctic krill. Baleen whales already represent one of the major consumers of krill, and as such compete with the fishery. However, they are not explicitly included either in the monitoring programme or the krill fisheries management approach of th...

The sub-Antarctic island of South Georgia is surrounded by highly productive waters, supporting dense aggregations of Antarctic krill ( Euphausia superba ), a vital food source for globally important seabird and marine mammal populations. These waters also support a commercial fishery for Antarctic krill. Regular monitoring of key krill predator species is undertaken at South Georgia to detect any changes in the ecosystem in r...

We tracked adult emperor penguins from Rothschild Island, west Antarctic Peninsula in 2015/2016 during a summer with extensive sea ice of long duration, contrasting with past years of reduced sea ice extent associated with the recent, rapid, warming trend across the region. We fitted ARGOS PTT devices to penguins of unknown breeding status. Of 33 penguins tracked, nine returned to the colony, presumably to provision offspring....

In Antarctica, abundant consumers rely on Antarctic krill for food, but krill are also the subject of a commercial fishery. The fishery overlaps in time and space with the foraging areas of these consumers, thus potential competition between krill fisheries and krill consumers is a major management concern. The fishery is managed by the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources with an ecosystem appr...

Species extinction risk is accelerating due to anthropogenic climate change, making it urgent to protect vulnerable species through legal frameworks in order to facilitate conservation actions that help mitigate risk. Here, we discuss fundamental concepts for assessing climate change risks to species using the example of the emperor penguin ( Aptenodytes forsteri ), currently being considered for protection under the US Endang...

As the global environmental crisis grows in scale and complexity, conservation professionals and policymakers are increasingly called upon to make decisions despite high levels of uncertainty, limited resources, and insufficient data. Global efforts to protect biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction require substantial international cooperation and negotiation, both of which are characterized by unpredictability and...

Many remote islands present barriers to effective wildlife monitoring in terms of challenging terrain and frequency of visits. The sub-Antarctic islands of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands are home to globally significant populations of seabirds and marine mammals. South Georgia hosts the largest breeding populations of Antarctic fur seals, southern elephant seals and king penguins as well as significant population...

The wandering albatross, Diomedea exulans, is a globally threatened species breeding at a number of sites within the Southern Ocean. Across the South Georgia archipelago, there are differences in population trends even at closely located colonies. Between 1999 and 2018 the largest colony, at Bird Island, declined at 3.01% per annum, while in the Bay of Isles, the decline was 1.44% per annum. Using mean demographic rates from a...

The relationship between population structure and demographic history is critical to understanding microevolution and for predicting the resilience of species to environmental change. Using mitochondrial DNA from extant colonies and radiocarbon‐dated subfossils, we present the first microevolutionary analysis of emperor penguins ( Aptenodytes forsteri ) and show their population trends throughout the last glacial maximum ( LGM...

Cumulative human impacts across the world's oceans are considerable. We therefore examined a single model taxonomic group, the penguins (Spheniscidae), to explore how marine species and communities might be at risk of decline or extinction in the southern hemisphere. We sought to determine the most important threats to penguins and to suggest means to mitigate these threats. Our review has relevance to other taxonomic groups i...

Antarctic and Southern Ocean ( ASO ) marine ecosystems have been changing for at least the last 30 years, including in response to increasing ocean temperatures and changes in the extent and seasonality of sea ice; the magnitude and direction of these changes differ between regions around Antarctica that could see populations of the same species changing differently in different regions. This article reviews current and expect...

Aim Competition for food among populations of closely related species and conspecifics that occur in both sympatry and parapatry can be reduced by interspecific and intraspecific spatial segregation. According to predictions of niche partitioning, segregation is expected to occur at habitat boundaries among congeners and within habitats among conspecifics, while negative relationships in the density of species or populations w...