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Alasheyev Bight

Penguin breeding site · Enderby Land · CCAMLR 58.4.2

Alasheyev Bight is a known penguin breeding site in the Enderby Land, at 67°39'S 46°07'E. Adélie penguins have been recorded here.

RegionEnderby Land
CCAMLR subarea58.4.2
Species recorded1
Sea ice within 100 km333 days a year, median
Site codeALAS
Position67°39'S 46°07'E
Decimal-67.6540, 46.1090
Distance to pole2,485 km
Populationnot published — see below

Species recorded here

Adélie penguinPygoscelis adeliae

The sea around this site, 1979–2024

0901802703661979 · 342 days1980 · 298 days1981 · 323 days1982 · 332 days1983 · 305 days1988 · 322 days1989 · 365 days1990 · 365 days1991 · 365 days1992 · 330 days1993 · 357 days1994 · 305 days1995 · 364 days1996 · 317 days1997 · 287 days1998 · 307 days1999 · 363 days2000 · 366 days2001 · 316 days2002 · 323 days2003 · 321 days2004 · 333 days2005 · 365 days2006 · 322 days2007 · 365 days2008 · 366 days2009 · 356 days2010 · 317 days2011 · 365 days2012 · 366 days2013 · 316 days2014 · 365 days2015 · 326 days2016 · 324 days2017 · 303 days2018 · 365 days2019 · 363 days2020 · 366 days2021 · 365 days2022 · 311 days2023 · 361 days198019851990199520002005201020152020DAYS A YEAR WITH SEA ICE OVER 15% WITHIN 100 KM · PALE BARS ARE ICE YEARS THE COVERAGE GATE DROPS
One bar per ice year, 15 February to 14 February. Fixed 0–366 axis.

Averaged over the 26 ocean cells within 100 km, this site carries sea ice for a median of 333 days a year, peaking at a median 99.4% concentration. The fitted change is +5.0 ± 6.1 days per decade, which does not clear its own error bars: no detectable change, and that is the answer rather than a gap.

This site is the one the thinning kept here. 6 other known breeding sites lie within 200 km of it and were set aside with it, so this stretch of coast is counted once rather than 7 times — that is what being one of the 56 independent places means. It does not mean the site is alone. The 728 measurable sites in this archive thin to 56 places.

In the 2023 ice year — the last one this archive holds — the sea ice here lasted 361 days, which is this site's 25th shortest season of 41 and above its own median of 333. It was below the median at 657 of the 728 sites measured here and at 44 of the 56 independent places, which is the most widespread short season in the record: the whole archive is drawn in one frame.

Two limits. This is the sea around the site and never the fast ice on it — at 25 km that is invisible. And the archive ends 2024-12-31, so it is a climate record rather than a current reading.

Why there is no count on this page

Penguins are too small to resolve from orbit. What is visible is the guano stain a colony leaves on the ice, which is why counting from satellite is a colour problem rather than a counting problem — and it is not solved. Our own detector correlates at r = −0.16 against ground counts across eight colonies, which is no relationship at all. Until that is fixed, this site publishes locations and says nothing about numbers. A number we cannot defend would be worse than none.

Nearest breeding sites

Nearest stations

60°SALASHEYEV BIGHT
Alasheyev Bight in Antarctic Polar Stereographic. Rings are 60°, 70° and 80°S.
Myall/McMahonCasey BayUmebosiS17 CampN188 KM
Within 377 km. Blue dots are other breeding sites, orange are stations.