Predatory Gulls hang around, if there are no deceased penguins, they gladly lunch on a deceased of their own species..
Punta Arenas, the southernmost town in Chilean Patagonia,
greeted us with sunshine and strong chill winds. I had planned to take a tour to Magdalena
Island, where the largest colony of Magellan Penguins makes their annual
breeding home for a few months. 60.000 pairs of them live here.
During the Austral winter these penguins roam as far as
southern Brazil, October they swim their way towards the south, and – with their
life long mate – search out their ‘home’ for the summer. They occupy the same
small cave in sandy island soil, year after year. It takes them five years
after being hatched in one of these caves before they are of breeding age and
find a mate. Each pair develops its own ‘love song’ by which they recognize
each other over long distances by sound alone.
Around November December, the pair produces one or two eggs,
and the chicks hatch about 45 days later. They are fluffy and have no feathers.
Both parents make daily trips into the ocean to catch and deliver food to their
ever hungry little ones, which in no time at all outweigh and outsize their
harried parents. The chicks molt, and
grow their first juvenile feathers – without the defining double black strip
across their fronts. Their parents go through the molting process after their
chicks are feathered up.
Then it is time to leave again – en masse – to areas further
north…
Magellan Penguins are only 60-70 cm tall, and weigh a
couple of kilos. Their habitat is threatened by global warming and general
climate change. However, the colony on Magdalena Island is a protected habitat,
and has been growing in numbers lately. On the other hand, the Otway Sound
colony of the same species has been diminishing.
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