A penguin chick at the San Diego Zoo. (by Tammy Spratt, San Diego Zoo Global)
Penguin chicks make a splash
World Penguin Day was Saturday, April 25, and two new residents of the Dan and Vi McKinney Penguin Habitat at the San Diego Zoo started the weekend celebration early by practicing what penguins do best – swimming.
This duo is the second set of chicks to hatch at the Zoo from eggs laid by the colony’s resident African penguins. The youngsters, who have not been named yet, were provided an opportunity for some important swimming lessons, in an effort to prepare them to join the rest of the colony and navigate the habitat’s large 275,000-gallon pool.
Over the past few weeks, the wildlife care team has worked closely with the birds to prepare them for life in the colony and build a trust-based relationship with team members. This specialized guidance involves coaching the chicks to accept meals fed to them by hand by wildlife care specialists, instead of through regurgitation from their parents; and slowly introducing the birds to the colony’s other residents. Wildlife care specialists said both of the young penguins are healthy, growing at a rapid rate and quickly learning and adapting to their training and their surroundings.
“Just a bit shy of 3 months old, they are already pretty self-sufficient, independent kids,” said Debbie Denton, wildlife care specialist at the penguin habitat inside the San Diego Zoo’s Conrad Prebys Africa Rocks. “They spend their days enjoying the pool and practicing their swimming skills. They have almost lost the last tiny tufts of down on their heads, and will be ready to meet the rest of the colony in the coming days.”
The chicks aren’t the only ones expected to enjoy World Penguin Day this year. San Diego Zoo Global is inviting the public to take part in a wealth of free online content, entertainment and educational tools geared toward penguin lovers around the world. As part of the #WereHereTogether Campaign, San Diego Zoo Global fans can waddle to the Zoo’s World Penguin Day website (https://zoo.sandiegozoo.org/world-penguin-day) and social media channels to enjoy a variety of entertaining options—including the drama-filled reality TV-style web series “Penguin Beach,” a 360-degree virtual reality video that immerses viewers into the penguin colony at Boulders Beach in Simon’s Town, South Africa, a site of current conservation efforts; Instagram question-and-answer sessions with knowledgeable wildlife care specialists; ZOONOOZ Online articles about penguins and ongoing conservation projects; and the increasingly popular live Penguin Cam, where watchers can follow the colony’s shenanigans in real-time video.
The African penguin is listed as Endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species. Once one of southern Africa’s most abundant seabirds, the species has suffered a massive population decline, from an estimated 1 million breeding pairs to only 23,000 breeding pairs today – a population decrease of more than 60 percent in the past 28 years.