Nearly 100 years of old tourist photos got a second life recently when researchers used them to reconstruct the rise and fall of a colony of seabirds on the Swedish island of Stora Karlsö. The island, designated a nature preserve in 1880 and a popular tourist destination since the 1920s, hosts a large population of common guillemots, one of the biggest species of auks. Ecologists Jonas Hentati-Sundberg and Olof Olsson of Stockholm University spent five years collecting images of the island from archives, museums, and island visitors in order to count guillemot numbers decade-to-decade. They found that the colony declined in the 1960s and 70s, when contaminants like DDT and PCB were prevalent, but has since rebounded to historically high numbers today, possibly because of an increase in the numbers of forage fish consumed by guillemots. “The population is currently increasing at an unprecedented rate of about 5 percent annually,” said Hentati-Sundberg. “This is interesting in that many common guillemot populations are decreasing worldwide.”
Old Photos Used to Study The Fate of a Swedish Seabird Colony
More From E360
-
INTERVIEW
Marina Silva on Brazil’s Fight to Turn the Tide on Deforestation
-
Solutions
Solomon Islands Tribes Sell Carbon Credits, Not Their Trees
-
INTERVIEW
With Sea Turtles in Peril, a Call for New Strategies to Save Them
-
RIVERS
Jared Kushner Has Big Plans for Delta of Europe’s Last Wild River
-
Energy
A Nuclear Power Revival Is Sparking a Surge in Uranium Mining
-
OPINION
Despite Official Vote, the Evidence of the Anthropocene Is Clear
-
INTERVIEW
At 11,500 Feet, a ‘Climate Fast’ to Save the Melting Himalaya
-
Oceans
Octopuses Are Highly Intelligent. Should They Be Farmed for Food?
-
Climate
Nations Are Undercounting Emissions, Putting UN Goals at Risk
-
Solutions
As Carbon Air Capture Ramps Up, Major Hurdles Remain
-
ANALYSIS
How China Became the World’s Leader on Renewable Energy
-
Biodiversity
As Flooding Increases on the Mississippi, Forests Are Drowning