LITTLE PENGUINS

To learn a little more about my visit to Perth Zoo in Western Australia, please follow this link to my journal [link]
I have now finished showing you all the animals from the African Savannah and I'm moving on to other parts of the zoo.
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LITTLE PENGUINS
Other common names - Fairy Penguin or Blue Penguins
Scientific Name - Eudyptula minor

In 1999, Perth Zoo opened an exciting Little Penguin exhibit, the Penguin Plunge. This exhibit is part of the Zoo's Australian Walkabout and includes a 50,000 litre saltwater pool with limestone reefs and beach areas with coastal vegetation, the whole exhibit is enveloped by a soft net to contain two other species of coastal bird which coexist with the penguins successfully.


Little Penguins are the smallest of all penguins and the only species to live permanently in Australian waters. Their range covers the southern coast of mainland Australia from Penguin Island in Western Australia to northern New South Wales and extending to Tasmania and New Zealand. Adults can grow to 40cms and weigh one kilogram.

Little Penguins are superbly designed for a life in water with a streamlined body, small wings modified as flippers and a tail that acts as a rudder. The fine pin-like feathers provide excellent waterproofing and insulation. Their fourteen neck vertebrae allow flexibility to preen the feathers with a wax like oil from a gland near the base of the tail.

A Little Penguin’s diet consists of anchovies, pilchards, whitebait and squid. Fishing excursions may be up to 200 kilometres, but most feeding is done within fifteen kilometres of their nesting site. Little Penguins usually fish within five metres of the surface, although they have been known to dive to sixty metres.

Breeding varies from year to year. At Penguin Island in Western Australia courtship starts between February and April. Two eggs are laid between April and August though usually only one chick survives, depending on food availability.

Penguins have an annual moult, which takes about fifteen days. During this time they are unable go to sea, because they have lost their waterproofing. This is a very stressful time for a penguin, during which they retire to their burrows or shelters and fast.

Their natural predators include sharks and seals.

Threats - Disturbance to their ocean and beach habitats effects both the survival and breeding of Little Penguins. Ocean threats include overfishing (especially of pilchards, whitebait and squid), the use of gill nets, disturbance from boating, oil spills and related pollution.

On land, predation and disturbance by cats, dogs and foxes, as well as careless recreational use of beaches by people, seriously effects Little Penguin survival.