Ecological trap ensnares endangered African penguins
▻https://news.mongabay.com/2017/02/ecological-trap-ensnares-endangered-african-penguins
Penguin numbers in South Africa’s Western Cape have plummeted by around 80 percent in recent decades. Biologists chalked this decline up to the disappearance of their favorite prey species, anchovies and sardines, from the Western Cape penguins’ preferred feeding grounds to the west of their nesting sites. Overfishing and changes in the water chemistry – knock-on effects of climate change – pushed breeding shoals of these fish eastward or wiped them out entirely.
