Penguin biogeography along the West Antarctic Peninsula: Testing the canyon hypothesis with Palmer LTER observations

The West Antarctic Peninsula (WAP) is home to large breeding colonies of the ice-dependent Antarctic Adélie penguin (Pygoscelis adeliae). Although the entire inner continental shelf is highly productive, with abundant phytoplankton and krill populations, penguin colonies are distributed heterogeneously along the WAP (Ducklow et al., 2013, in this issue). This ecological conundrum targets a long-standing question of interest: what environmental factors structure the locations of Adélie penguin "hot spots" throughout the WAP?

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