Pinguins info - penguin - information news archive about penguins

Penguin news from January - March 2003

Look out: These are older news flashes, so it's quite possible some links/sources doesn't work properly anymore!

King penguins in Berlin zoo move temporary to container. (Germany - 14 January 2003)

Because of leaks and problems with the large windows in the new exhibit, the 13 king penguins move into a container. The new exhibit was just opened in june 2002. They expect the repairing work will be finished begin March 2003, so till then the birds will remain unseen to visitors in the small 80 m₂ container. It's not completely new to them while they also lived in it before the opening. Four of the penguins came to the zoo from the sub Antarctic as 3-year old birds in 1979, the other 9 are born in the zoo.

Source: Berlin Zeitung (GE) and Tagesspiegel (GE)
Marineland park employee holds young rockhopper penguins in Antibes (16 January 2003)

A Marineland Park employee holds five of the eleven Rockhopper penguins (Eudyptes chrysocome) which hatched a week ago at the marine zoo in Antibes, on the French Riviera, January 9, 2003.
The penguin eggs were flown to the zoo from the French island of Crozet near the Antarctic.

Source: Planet Ark
Californian penguins swim in mock migration to nowhere (USA - 21 January 2003)

The magellanic penguins at the San Francisco Zoo are swimming around in circles for hours at a time because they have been bamboozled by six new birds into performing a mock migration, officials said.
The marathon started end December when the 6 newcomers joined the colony, leaving the zoo's penguin keeper Jane Tollini scratching her head as to how the birds from Sea World in Ohio, convinced the 46 others to start in with the frenzied swimming.
They are so determined even a lack of water cannot keep the birds from the 130-feet (40 metres) long, 40-feet (12 metres) wide pool. When zoo keepers first drained the pool for cleaning, the penguins simply jumped in and walked around the bottom, Tollini said.
Penguin experts say the birds are highly social and curious creatures and suggest the newcomers may have made such a splash that the others simply decided to follow.
For her part, penguin keeper Tollini predicts things will get back to normal in February when the onset of the breeding season will hopefully lure the birds back to their burrows.

Source: Planet Ark and San Francisco Zoo
Penguins threaten oldest building in Antarctica (4 February 2003)

According to representatives from the Antarctic Heritage Trust, Carsten Borchgrevink's hut is being destroyed by a mountain of penguin guano. Carsten Borchgrevink was the first person to make a confirmed landing in 1895 on the Antarctic Continent, and this hut is the first building to ever be contructed on the continent. Some 100,000 Adelie penguins were around Borchgrevink's tumbledown prefabricated living quarters and their excrement is piling up against the shack.

Source: Yahoo/Reuters
Humboldt penguin reserve in danger (14 February 2003)

The Humboldt Penguin National reserve in Chile is under threat from a proposed hotel development.
read more and sign the online petition here.
Fresh secret of penguin dads revealed (22 February 2003)

Male king penguins store undigested food in their stomachs for up to three weeks. The talent is unique among higher vertebrates and ensures a constant supply of food for their chicks. But how they do it was a mystery. Now an analysis of the birds' stomach contents shows the penguins keep food fresh by destroying bacteria in their stomachs, suggesting that they produce an antibacterial agent in their digestive tracts.

Source: New Scientist and Polar biology

Penguin news from April - June 2003

Look out: These are older news flashes, so it's quite possible some links/sources doesn't work properly anymore!

Bugs come to aid of penguins (UK - 7 May 2003)

Bacteria are being used to help protect penguins in UK zoos threatened by avian malaria. Tests at Bristol zoo - which had already lost two king penguins - have had encouraging results, with no fresh infections since the introduction of the bacteria.

Source: BBC
Penguins for carnival parade in Roermond 2004. (Netherlands - 3 June 2003)

On monday 23 februari 2004, a penguin family will walk in the carnaval parade in Roermond (Netherlands).
They build a wagon with a large penguin from papermache on it and the group (about 20 adults and 10 children) will be dressed in similar penguin suits.
People from the neighbourhood of Roermond, who want to join them (Dutch understanding and speaking, please), can take contact (before September 2003) with Paul Dingjan and Tilly Limpens.
Remember: the suits will be made in group (everybody the same!), so don't contact them from the States or so ;-)
You should live close to Roermond and, on regular basis, be able to help.
Visitors from all around the world are welcome to visit the parade that day.
Fox murders in penguin colony (Netherlands - 15 June 2003)

During the night of 12 June, an European fox has killed 11 and injured 6 others of a total of arican penguins in the Burgers' Zoo in Arnhem (NL). Two of the injured were so badly hurt the vet had to let them go. The four others are still at risk.
The zoo is located in a regio with a large population of foxes, which is partly protected too. This african penguin colony was one of the largest on earth in a zoo. Last years they could give about 15 penguins yearly to other zoos for breeding programms.
It is clearly that it was a fox, because a bird of prey or marten would only have killed one and take him away. But foxes kill many more than they can eat. This fox even took not a single penguin with him.
Burgers' Zoo is now searching how they can protect the zoo even more as they already did.

Source: Dierennieuws
Papa Pinguin died (Belgium - 26 June 2003)

In the night of June 25th, Marcel Boulez has left us. Born on October 4th, 1945, he is better known as Papa Pinguin in Antwerp, while for more than 30 years he cared for the penguins in the zoo there. Everybody who saw him talking there with them, could clearly see his passion: he loved, fed, cared and treated them as his childs and they loved him too.
He even wrote a book about his passion.

Penguin news from July - September 2003

Look out: These are older news flashes, so it's quite possible some links/sources doesn't work properly anymore!

Penguins get ice lollies (UK - 7 August 2003)

To keep cool during the heat wave, penguins get icelollies in Londoner Zoo.

Source: Planet Ark
Moody Gardens penguins breed to Barry White (12 August 2003)

Keepers at Moody Gardens Aquarium, Galveston in Texas, used the music of Barry White and dimmed lights to try and help ten chinstrap penguins get in the mood to breed.

Source: News24
Penguins in Italy (August 2003)

In several towns in Italy, you can find penguins on the street. They live in Torino, Milano and Pisa and some more towns around. The artwork is designed and made by Pao, strange creatures born on the cement of the street furniture of Milano, Italy.

Source: Pao penguins
Is rise in tourism helping Antarctica or hurting it? (22 August 2003)

While tourism has doubled and redoubled in the last decade, environmentalists worry about the possible consequences of it, like oilspills and disruption of wildlife breeding.

Source: National Geographic
Weather and penguins delay Gere film (22 August 2003)

The filming of "Emperor Zehnder" about the famous photographer Bruno Penguin Zehnder, starring Richard Gere, has been delayed a year. Reasons are weather in Antarctica and the peculiarities of penguins. (see also November 8th, 2001)

Source: Ireland Online
Belgian artist Mark Dedrie makes penguin sculptures. (Belgium - 23 August 2003)

Belgian artist Mark Dedrie makes inox and bronze penguin sculptures.

Source: Mark Dedrie
Penguins in Magdeburger Zoo move in renewed exhibit (Germany - 28 August 2003)

The 20 humboldt penguins in the zoo at Magdeburg (GE) got for a few days a new home.

Source: Magdeburger General Anzeiger (GE) and Volksstimme.de (GE)
Inauguration of the memorial to Bruno Penguin Zehnder (Switzerland - 30 August 2003)

Saturday, August 30, 2003 the official inauguration of the memorial to Bruno Penguin Zender took place in Bad Ragaz (Switzerland).
Following a Sowjet tradition the family of any expedition member who died in Antarctica will receive a stone. Thus to commemorate their beloved ones who will never leave Antarctica but are buried on Buromsky-Island.
Bruno P. Zehnder too is buried on Buromsky-Island and his family was to receive a stone from Antarctica. It was onwarded to Sepp Azzola, a stonemason near Bad Ragaz. With patience and expertise he chiseled two Emperor Penguins and their chicks into the stone. The stone is placed between the trees of a small park along the river Tamina, a three-minutes-walk from the center. In the middle of Bad Ragaz; which was his native village, the place he left in early years and yet he always gladly returned to.

Source: Unter Pinguinen
Next performance of the project Among Penguins (August 2003)

February 21 to April 4, 2004, a new exhibition from Bruno Zehnders pictures and personal belongings takes place in Caves de Courten, Sierre (Switzerland).

Source: Among penguins
Penguin loo paper a hit in Oamaru, New Zealand (19 September 2003)

The blue penguin design on CottonSofts' printed toilet paper has been so popular in Oamaru (home of the Oamaru Blue Penguin Colony) that the company has agreed to have special four-roll packs of penguin-only toilet paper made up for the Oamaru market.

Source: Stuff.co.nz

Penguin news from October - December 2003

Look out: These are older news flashes, so it's quite possible some links/sources doesn't work properly anymore!

Nature haven of Dassen Island to open to tourists (South Africa - 2 October 2003)

For the first time, tourists will soon be able to visit a remote part of South Africa that is home to the world's largest breeding colony of african penguins. Visitors will be flown there by helicopter and the opportunity to visit the island will cost them R2 600 and only 12 people will be accommodated in a week.

Source: Cape Times
What B15 split means for Crozier's emperor penguins (Antarctica - 2 November 2003)

A powerful storm at Antarctica caused a split of the world's largest iceberg B15. Over the last 2 years B15 has greatly affected the emperor penguin colony at Cape Crozier. Penguin researcher Gerald Kooyman of Scripps Institution of Oceanography estimates nearly 75 percent of the emperor penguins previously counted at Cape Crozier are no longer around. Adelie penguins at the Ross Island colonies have also been affected by B15. They found many dead bodies of adult penguins and chicks and unhatched eggs, buried in ice.

Source: Antarctic Sun
Penguin barometer (10 November 2003)

As occupants of one of the places most severely effected by global warming, adélie penguins at Antarctica are a barometer of nature's well-being worldwide; In the neighbourhood of Palmer Station, an American research base where Dr Fraser works, more than 30,000 adults and around 20,000 chicks used to fill the air with their clamour. But in this region, which has warmed more than almost anywhere else on Earth, barely 8,000 birds now survive.
Bill Fraser says that although Adelie penguins elsewhere in Antarctica are still doing fine, the birds in this warmed region serve as an "early warning system" for the rest of the natural world - and the prognosis isn't good: "We're saying that Adelies are likely to be locally extinct in the next 20 years."

Source: Radio Nederland
Iceberg collapse saves penguin colonies (Antarctica - 21 November 2003)

The 300km-long iceberg B-15, which calved off the Ross ice shelf in March 2000, has now broken up enough to let open seawater in, saving four Adelie penguin colonies who have been blocked off from easy access to the sea for the past two summers. With much easier access to their food source, penguin parents should now be able to find enough fish to feed themselves and their chicks.

Source: NZ Herald
From the Antarctic: Bird's-eye view under ice (21 November 2003)

Using an observation tube lowered 3m under sea ice that allows Antarctic scientists to record the way emperor penguins dive, New Zealand Herald photographer Mark Mitchell took an amazing photo of an emperor penguin diving under the ice in McMurdo sound.

Source: NZ Herald
Antarctic witnesses total eclipse (24 November 2003)

Tourists paid a lot of money to see the total eclipse of the sun on Sunday night in Antarctica, which was visible for barely two minutes.
Mr Jones, a veterinary pathologist from Victoria in Australia, said the local wildlife was unfazed by the solar phenomenon. He said there was no discernable change in the penguins that were incubating their eggs out on the ice.
"The penguins didn't show any degree of agitation or worry or anything," Mr Jones said.

Source: BBC
Penguin dressed as Santa Claus (Japan - 26 November 2003)

A penguin dressed as Santa Claus greets visitors during a Christmas show at Hakeijima Sea Paradise aquarium in Yokohama, south of Tokyo November 23, 2003.
Although the picture looks funny, it seems very uncomfortable for the penguin.

Source: Planet Ark
King penguins move to renewed exhibit in Münchener Zoo Hellabrunn (Germany - 27 November 2003)

The six king penguins in Hellabrunn, the zoo in München (GE), were very relaxed as they moved in their renewed exhibit. The surface increased from 80 till 130 m² and they got a new air- and filtersystem. Through a glass wall, visitors can see how the birds behave under ten new spots, that should simulate the antarctic light. By increasing the size, the zoo prevent young chicks, who can't swim during their childhood, to fall in the water. Even last May a chick hatched here.

Source: Süddeutsche Zeitung (GE)
'De kleine Rotterdamse Pinguïn Encyclopedie' is out (Netherlands - 27 November 2003)

A new book for Dutch understanding penguin lovers.
It is made like an Encyclopedia, with special things about penguins.
Knowledge about penguins in media, film, books, with a lot of pictures.

Source: Pinguïn encyclopedie