week of 1/22/03
 
 
 


The Naturalist's Corner
SMN
Who says you can’t teach an old penguin new tricks?

Forty-six Magellanic penguins had, for years, spent a leisurely, mostly sedentary life on their island in a 200-foot pool in the San Francisco Zoo. Late last year, six more Magellanic penguins that had been kept in an Ohio theme park and later at Sea World in San Diego were added to the mix.

Around Christmas Eve, the six newcomers hit the pool, and it wasn’t just to stretch their flippers. These guys appeared to be on a mission. In the wild, Magellanic penguins migrate more than 2,000 miles annually between Brazil and Patagonia. These newcomers seemed to be in a migration state of mind.

Soon the fever spread and all 52 penguins were in the pool and have been for the last four weeks. It appears they’re dedicated to making a 50,000-lap migration.

Penguin keeper Jane Tollini has no explanation. “I can’t explain it. They’ve swum more in the last three weeks than they have in the last five years,” she told the Associated Press.

Nothing seems to deter these birds. When the pool was drained for cleaning, they simply jumped in and walked around.

These little black-and-white torpedoes are powerful swimmers. They can reach speeds of up to 15 miles per hour and swim for hours on end. Tollini said her birds are at it from dawn till dusk.

Penguins have been swimming for some time. Fossil records of the flippered bird date back 50 million years. These penguin ancestors were even larger than today’s largest species, the Emperor penguin, which reaches five feet in length.

The Magellanic is the most common of the world’s 17 penguin species. This dapper, black-and-white critter is about 30 inches in length and weighs between eight and 13 pounds. In the wild it dines on squid and small schooling fish like sardines.

In turn, adult Magellanics are preyed upon by sea lions and killer whales. The chicks are sometimes taken by large gulls and skuas.

The penguins nest in large colonies. They dig burrows or make shallow depressions under low bushes. They generally lay two eggs but usually only one chick is raised to adulthood. Magellanics have a life span of 25 years in the wild and 30 in captivity.

Tollini said her penguins at the zoo are usually home bound at this time. They generally retire to their burrows around November and begin sprucing up for nesting season. She said the birds are pretty inconspicuous till February when they emerge from their burrows. Eggs begin to appear in April and chicks are on the scene 40 days later. But with this mysterious migration underway, all bets are off.

This migration is presenting some problems for Tollini. She said that some of the birds are becoming thinner, and when they do hit Penguin Island for a short respite they’re nervous wrecks.

I don’t know if anyone has been counting laps but, right now, it seems no one has any idea when this migration might end. We will surely keep an eye on this and report back at a later date.

(Don Hendershot can be reached at don@smokymountainnews.com)