Abstract:
Macaroni penguins spend the winter at sea and return to colonies on land during the austral spring to reproduce. Arrival weights of male and female Macaroni penguins on Bird Island, South Georgia have been monitored since 1988. The current protocol is that 50 males are weighed on 28th October and 50 females on 8th November.
This dataset is an updated version of Trathan, P., Waluda, C., & Ratcliffe, N. (2021). Arrival weights of Macaroni penguins at Bird Island, from 1988 to 2020 (Version 1.0) [Data set]. NERC EDS UK Polar Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/a5174472-204d-45d4-862c-3befc32b52ca. The update consists of five additional years of data. No changes have been made to the data included in version 1.0 of the dataset.
This work was funded by Natural Environment Research Council (UK) core funding to the British Antarctic Survey.
Keywords:
Bird Island, Eudyptes chrysolophus, arrival mass, macaroni penguin
Trathan, P.N., Waluda, C.M., Ratcliffe, N., & Bennison, A. (2026). Arrival weights of macaroni penguins at Bird Island, from 1988 to 2025 - VERSION 2.0 (Version 2.0) [Data set]. NERC EDS UK Polar Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/472713db-3724-442f-8a24-a1f8834123d9
| Access Constraints: | None. |
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| Use Constraints: | This data is governed by the NERC data policy http://www.nerc.ac.uk/research/sites/data/policy/ and supplied under Open Government Licence v.3 http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/. |
| Creation Date: | 2026-02-02 |
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| Dataset Progress: | Complete |
| Dataset Language: | English |
| ISO Topic Categories: |
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| Parameters: |
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| Personnel: | |
| Name | UK Polar Data Centre |
| Role(s) | Metadata Author |
| Organisation | British Antarctic Survey |
| Name | Dr Philip N Trathan |
| Role(s) | Investigator |
| Organisation | British Antarctic Survey |
| Name | Dr Claire M Waluda |
| Role(s) | Investigator |
| Organisation | British Antarctic Survey |
| Name | Dr Norman Ratcliffe |
| Role(s) | Investigator |
| Organisation | British Antarctic Survey |
| Name | Dr Ashley Bennison |
| Role(s) | Investigator, Technical Contact |
| Organisation | British Antarctic Survey |
| Parent Dataset: | N/A |
| Reference: | Trathan, P. N., Fielding, S., Hollyman, P. R., Murphy, E. J., Warwick-Evans, V., Collins, M. A. (2021) Enhancing the ecosystem approach for the fishery for Antarctic krill within the complex, variable, and changing ecosystem at South Georgia. ICES Journal of Marine Science. 78:6 2065-2081 https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsab092 Trathan, P., Waluda, C., Ratcliffe, N., & Bennison, A. (2026). Fledging weights of macaroni penguin chicks from a colony at Fairy Point, Bird Island, from 1989 to 2025 - VERSION 2.0 [Data set]. NERC EDS UK Polar Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/694d1d07-da51-42b7-94b0-4404e50bdf99 Trathan, P., Waluda, C., Ratcliffe, N., & Bennison, A. (2026). Breeding success of macaroni penguins at Bird Island, South Georgia, from 1978 to 2025 - VERSION 2.0 [Data set]. NERC EDS UK Polar Data Centre. https://doi.org/10.5285/8902f094-1d1f-4092-9aa5-180a2a8e57ec |
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| Lineage/Methodology: | Penguins at the colony at Goldcrest Point (Big Mac) are caught at the main entry point, sexed and weighed. Sex is ascertained by measuring their bill depth at the mandibular symphysis, with males having bill depth > 24mm and females < 24mm. 50 males are weighed on 28th October and 50 females on 8th November. All birds are weighed using a 10kg Pesola and bag. Care is taken to ensure no individual is weighed more than once. All data were collected under permit from the Government of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. All sampling procedures used are regulated by the British Antarctic Survey Ethical Review Committee in collaboration with Cambridge University and the UK Home Office. This dataset has been updated to add five additional years of counts. The metadata has been updated accordingly. |
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| Ownership: | ||
| Temporal Coverage: | |
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| Start Date | 1988-10-22 |
| End Date | 2025-11-08 |
| Spatial Coverage: | |
| Latitude | |
| Southernmost | -54.0078 |
| Northernmost | -54.0078 |
| Longitude | |
| Westernmost | -38.0777 |
| Easternmost | -38.0777 |
| Altitude | |
| Min Altitude | N/A |
| Max Altitude | N/A |
| Depth | |
| Min Depth | N/A |
| Max Depth | N/A |
| Location: | |
| Location | South Georgia Island |
| Detailed Location | Goldcrest Point, Bird Island |
| Data Storage: | x1 .csv file |
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