Melbourne, Australia – An emperor penguin found malnourished far from its Antarctic home on Australia’s southern coast is being cared for by wildlife experts, a government department said on Friday.
An adult male was found on November 1 on a popular tourist beach in the town of Denmark in temperate southwest Australia – about 2,200 miles north of the icy waters of the Antarctic coast, according to a statement from Western Australia’s Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions.
The largest penguin species had never been reported in Australia before, University of Western Australia researcher Belinda Cannell said, although some had reached New Zealand, Australia’s neighbor almost entirely south of Denmark. It is believed to be the furthest north – and thus furthest from its natural habitat – that wild emperor penguins have ever been found.
DBCA through AP
“The most north we’re going from Antarctica is about 50 degrees south (latitude) from my reading and Ocean Beach is 35 degrees south,” Cannell told Australia’s national broadcaster ABC last week. “So, it’s a lot more north than we’ve been tracking the emperor penguins from Antarctica before.”
Cannell said he did not know why the penguins ended up on the Australian coast. He advised seabird rehabilitator Carol Biddulph, who cared for the penguins, to spray them with a cold water mist to help them cope with the alien climate.
The penguin is 39 inches tall and originally weighed 51 pounds. A healthy male emperor penguin can weigh over 100 pounds.
Western Australia’s department of biodiversity said efforts were focused on rehabilitating the animals. Asked if the penguins could return to Antarctica, the department replied that “options are still being considered.”
Miles Brotherson / AP
ABC said last week that the errant animal was first spotted by a local surfer from Denmark, Aaron Fowler, who told the network and some friends were baffled when they first saw it out of the water.
“It stood in the waves and just waddled straight to us, an emperor penguin, which is probably about a meter tall, and not shy at all,” Fowler told ABC.
“There are some wild animals in the water but no penguins,” he said. “They tried to do things like, slide on their stomachs, thinking it was snow, I just planted them in the sand and stood up and shook all the sand.”
Emperor penguins are among the species most immediately threatened by rising ocean and sea temperatures worldwide. According to The World Wildlife Foundation, about three-quarters of the world’s emperor penguin colonies are vulnerable to annual sea level fluctuations. ice caps in Antarcticawhich has become more erratic due to climate change.
Penguins breed and live on sea ice, but Antarctic Sea ice is disappearing as our planet warms.
“They appear in the breeding season and there is no ice, so there is no place to breed,” Dr. Birgitte McDonald, an ecologist at Moss Landing Marine Laboratories, which is funded and managed by San Jose State University, told CBS San Francisco last year.
An analysis by scientists at the University of Cambridge, published last year in the journal Science News found that “the ice in one area is melting especially at the beginning of the year,” putting the emperor chicks at great risk.
“Emperor penguins — their survival, their ability to reproduce — are 100% tied to having suitable sea ice,” McDonald told CBS San Francisco.
