Advertising on the portal

When is mating season for penguins? Penguin behavior

Penguins are flightless seabirds.

Family: Penguins

Class: Birds

Order: Penguin-like

Type: Chordata

Kingdom: Animals

Domain: Eukaryotes

Penguin anatomy

The body of penguins has a streamlined shape. This body shape is very comfortable when swimming in water. The entire body is covered with waterproof feathers, which are arranged very tightly and protect the penguin from wetness and winds. The penguin has two wings, which under water look more like two propellers. The penguin walks on two short and thick legs and its tail also serves as support. The bird's tail is very hard, consisting of 17-20 not very long feathers. Unlike other birds, the penguin stays strictly vertical on land. Penguins' beaks are very sharp and strong. In order for the penguin to be comfortable in the cold areas of the planet, it has a 2-3 centimeter layer of fat under its skin. Penguins' eyes are well adapted for diving, but on land the bird becomes nearsighted.

The size of penguins varies depending on their species. For example, the largest Emperor penguin can reach a height of 120-130 centimeters and weigh up to 40 kg, and the largest small view penguins – The small penguin can reach a height of up to 40 cm and a body weight of up to 1 kg. All penguins have approximately the same coloring - dark back and white belly. Penguins molt once a year. During molting, the penguin becomes “shaggy”. During this period, the penguin is on land and does not eat anything.

Penguin habitat

You can't see penguins everywhere. These birds love the cold very much. Therefore, their habitat is the coldest corners Southern Hemisphere. Penguins can be found on the continent of Antarctica, in the south of the continent of Africa, in the south of the continent of Australia and, of course, in the south of the continent of South America.

Penguin lifestyle

Penguins are excellent swimmers. They can dive to depths from 3 to 130 meters. Sometimes it’s simply huge distances to overcome (more than 20 km). Penguins can reach speeds in water of up to 10 km/h. And at a time when they are not concerned about offspring, they can go into the open sea 1000 km from the coast.

If the penguin needs to move on land, then here too he has interesting way. It lies on its belly, pushes off with its paws and slides along the snow or ice. With this method of movement, penguins can reach speeds of up to 7 km/h.

Penguins live in groups. You could even say colonies. On the shore, they unite in flocks, the number of which can reach tens and hundreds of thousands of individuals.

What do penguins eat?

Penguins' favorite food is fish, but the bird also eats octopus, squid, crustaceans, mollusks and plankton with great pleasure.

Penguin breeding

These birds, like Swans and the Mandarin Duck, are monogamous birds. This means that the couple is chosen alone and for life.

Sexual maturity is reached at different ages in different penguin species, but not before the penguin is 2 years old, and in Golden-haired penguins puberty generally achieved at the age of five years. The male, trying to attract the attention of the female, begins to make very loud sounds that are similar to the sound of a trumpet.

Penguins choose a nest site on the shore or in rock recesses. The nest is made from pebbles and plants. The female can lay up to 3 eggs at a time. But three is very rare. Most often there is one white or greenish color. Both take a role in incubating the eggs. Since the parents need to eat, they take turns to hunt.

The parents incubate the eggs for up to 100 days (here it all depends on the type of penguin). The shortest incubation period is 30 days. The chicks hatch blind and with very thick plumage. Until the chick molts and has feathers like its parents, it does not enter the water. And he is constantly on land. After two weeks, the penguin chick can already see fully. For about three weeks, the female and male do not leave their offspring. And then they leave their children, only occasionally bringing them food. The chicks begin to form groups that people call nurseries. On average, only half of the chicks survive.

Penguins video:

In nature, penguins live for about 25 years, but in captivity this figure can increase to 40 years if the penguin is properly maintained.

If you liked it this material, share it with your friends on social networks. Thank you!

However, not only the indigenous inhabitants of Antarctica are these amazing birds, since penguins also live, for example, in... Africa (yes, such a paradox), but only in its southernmost part, on the territory of South Africa (South African Republic). These flightless birds with interesting habits and unusual appearance have long been the object of study by many zoologists and heroes of children's cartoons (such as Madagascar). The word “penguin” itself, according to one version, is of Welsh origin and comes from the words “pen” - head and “gwyn” - white, which was the original name for the now extinct great auk, which was very similar to penguins, and this name later passed on to them. According to another version, the name “penguin” comes from the English “pinwing”, which means wingspin. And finally, according to the third version, the name of penguins is of Latin origin, since on Latin word"pinguis" means "thick".

Penguin: description, structure, characteristics. What does a penguin look like?

Without exception, all penguins are first-class swimmers, and they can also dive well. But, unfortunately, they literally cannot fly at all. And on the ground they move very clumsily due to the structural features of their body.

The penguin's body has a streamlined shape and developed muscles of the pectoral keel, which sometimes makes up a quarter of the total mass of this bird. Also, the body of penguins is usually quite plump (here we remember the Latin name of this bird) and covered with feathers on the sides.

Penguin head not so good large sizes However, it has a mobile, flexible and short neck and has a powerful and sharp beak.

Why does a penguin need wings if it can't fly? Such a logical question may arise, and we will answer it, the fact is that the wings of a penguin, in the process of evolution, were transformed into flippers, which rotate in shoulder joint according to the screw principle, all this turns the penguin into an excellent swimmer.

The penguin's legs are short and at the same time thick, each leg has 4 toes, connected by swimming membranes. It is the structure of their legs that leads to the fact that penguins move so funny and clumsily; they are designed in such a way that they always have to keep their body strictly vertical to the surface of the earth.

Penguins have short tail, consisting of 16-20 feathers, it helps them maintain balance and, if necessary, they can even lean on it like a stand.

The skeleton of a penguin, unlike other birds, does not consist of hollow tubular bones; the bones of a penguin are more similar to the bones of mammals. The harsh Antarctic cold helps penguins endure a warming reserve of fat, which has a layer of 2-3 centimeters.

The plumage of penguins is thick and dense; the body of the bird is covered with feathers like tiles, which also protect them from getting wet. cold water. The color of the feathers and the penguins themselves is the same - a dark back and a white belly.

About once a year, penguins molt, old feathers fall out, and new ones grow in their place. During this period, penguins are located exclusively on land, where they try to shelter as much as possible from gusts of wind and generally cold weather.

The sizes of penguins vary depending on their species, so the largest, the emperor penguin, is 117-130 cm long and weighs up to 40 kg. The little penguin reaches only 40 cm in length and weighs on average about 1 kg.

Where do penguins live

IN natural conditions penguins live in the southern hemisphere of our planet, preferring cold Antarctica most of all. But in addition to this icy continent, they also live in southern South America, southern Australia and New Zealand, as well as in South Africa. It is true that it is worth noting that everyone, including African penguins, settles exclusively in places where there are cold ocean currents.

How long do penguins live?

Under natural conditions, the life expectancy of a penguin is 15-25 years. In zoos at ideal conditions If kept, these birds can live up to 30 years.

What do penguins eat?

Penguins are omnivorous birds, so their diet includes a variety of sea ​​fish, crayfish, plankton, small mollusks. Small fish or squid can also become food for the penguin. Penguins get their prey in the water, because it’s not for nothing that they are excellent swimmers. During a hunt, a penguin can make up to 900 dives; the penguin's speed in the water can reach up to 10 km per hour. During sea hunting, the beak of a penguin works on the principle of a pump; it sucks in all small prey along with water.

Penguin Enemies

In turn, penguins can become prey for other larger marine predators: sharks, killer whales, fur seals, leopard seals and sea lions. Seagulls are also natural enemies of penguins, as they often peck at their eggs. Small penguin chicks are desirable prey for skuas.

Penguin lifestyle

The most interesting feature regarding the lifestyle of these birds is the fact that matriarchy dominates penguin society. It is the female penguins who choose the males they like, care for them, seek their recognition, then the males, in turn, hatch the eggs, while the females get food. IN general role The relationships between the sexes in penguins are diametrically opposed to many other representatives of the animal world.

Penguins are collective creatures and do not just live in families or flocks, but form entire bird colonies that can reach up to a million individuals. And on Zavadovsky Island, located in the South Atlantic, the world's largest colony of chinstrap penguins is known; according to rough estimates, about 10 million of these birds live there.

Penguins love to be in the company of their own kind, but during the mating season for procreation, the male and female temporarily leave the company of their relatives and return back with a newborn baby, but we will write about this in more detail below.

Types of penguins, photos and names

According to modern classification There are 6 genera and 19 species of penguins in the world, we will describe the most interesting of them.

This representative of the penguin kingdom is the most majestic (it’s not for nothing that it has such a name) and the largest: the weight of the emperor penguin reaches 40 kg with a height of up to 115 cm. Emperor penguins live exclusively on the coast of Antarctica. (By the way, we have an interesting article on our website about them - “—eternal exiles in the ice,” follow the link).

It is very similar to its imperial relative, but is somewhat inferior in size: its height, on average, is 90-100 cm, with a weight of 10-18 kg. The color of the feathers is also different: the back is dark gray, sometimes almost black, the belly is white, as befits a penguin, and there are bright orange spots on the sides of the head. King penguins live on many islands in the South Atlantic.

These penguins are medium in size, Adélie is 65-75 cm long and weighs 6 kg. Another distinctive feature of this species is the presence of white rings around the eyes. Adélie penguins live in Antarctica and some adjacent islands (Orkney, South Scotland).

Distinctive feature The northern crested penguin has tufts of black and yellow feathers on its head, giving the bird a more than unusual appearance. The size of this penguin is 55 cm in length and weighs up to 3 kg. It lives on a number of islands in the South Atlantic and is now, unfortunately, endangered.

In appearance, it is almost identical to other penguins, but has one interesting feature– a bunch of golden feathers flaunts above his head (hence his name). The body length and weight are slightly greater than that of the crested penguin: length - 60-70 cm, weight - 5-6 kg. Also lives in the South Atlantic and Indian Ocean.

This penguin takes an honorable second place after the emperor in size, its length reaches 90 cm, weight - up to 9 kg. Also characteristic feature This type of penguin is characterized by their beak, which is colored orange-red.

The Magellanic penguin, as its name suggests, lives in the Strait of Magellan in South America. The body length of the Magellanic penguin is 70-80 cm, with a weight of 5-6 kg. The coloring of these penguins is characterized by the presence of one or two black stripes around the neck.

This penguin, which lives on the coast of Antarctica and adjacent islands, in addition to its signature penguin coloring, has an additional black stripe that runs along its head. Its length is 60-70 cm and its weight is 4-5 kg.

Also known as the donkey penguin, black-footed penguin, or African penguin. Unlike its fellows living in cold Antarctic conditions, this penguin lives in South Africa, on the territory of South Africa (South African Republic), they are also found on the coasts of neighboring Namibia, but only in places where there is a cold ocean current. These penguins are also distinguished from their relatives by a narrow black horseshoe-shaped stripe located on their chest.

This type of penguin is the smallest in the penguin family, its height is no more than 40 cm, with a weight of up to 1 kg. These small penguins live on the coasts of Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania and the adjacent islands.

Penguin breeding

We touched a little on the question of how penguins reproduce in the section on their lifestyle, now we’ll talk about this in even more detail. Firstly, matriarchy prevails among penguins, and females choose males for mating, and not vice versa. Secondly, penguins are monogamous and mate for life.

Penguins reach sexual maturity after two years. So, with the onset of the mating season, young females choose a suitable male for themselves, and retire with him to mate. As a result of this, after a certain time, the female appears 1-2 eggs (in in rare cases there may be three of them). But it is not the mother, but the father penguin who is incubating the eggs and taking care of them. At this time, the female is engaged in obtaining food, both for herself and for her “husband”, who is busy with an extremely important task.

After about 30-100 days (depending on the type of penguin), small chicks hatch from the eggs; they are at first blind, and only after several weeks do they begin to see. Despite the care and protection of their parents, approximately 60% of the chicks die from hunger, cold and attack birds of prey- skuas, who love to feast on penguin chicks.

Before their first molt, the little penguin chicks are exclusively on land; only with the appearance of thick, waterproof plumage can they dive into the water.

As they grow older, little penguins begin to unite in small groups, which zoologists call a kind of “kindergarten” for penguins. This association also has practical significance, since in a group it is easier for young penguins to protect themselves from predatory skuas.

Do they eat penguins?

More likely no than yes. Although penguin meat tastes good (according to the stories of some travelers), it has a stench that is very specific to the human nose. However, some peoples living on the southern islands and European polar explorers exploring Antarctica ate penguins as food. The latter did this simply so as not to die of hunger due to lack of food.

  • The first European who was lucky enough to see penguins with his own eyes was the great Spanish navigator Ferdinand Magellan (the same one who made the first trip around the world in history). In fact, Magellan penguins are named after him. This significant event took place back in 1520 near the island of Novaya Zemlya.
  • Penguins even have their own record-breaking swimmers, such as the Gentoo penguins, who can reach speeds of up to 36 km per hour in the water.
  • As you know, penguins are very clumsy and clumsy on land, and once they fall, they cannot get up on their own. For this reason, at some polar Antarctic stations Even such a specific profession as “penguin lifter” appeared, a person whose duties include helping penguins rise.

Penguins, video

And finally, an interesting documentary about difficult life emperor penguins.

Undoubtedly, the penguin is an amazing polar bird that lives in conditions that would seem unbearable for living organisms.

One of the researchers wrote that Antarctica, which is a gloomy land, leaves many bright memories for people who visit it. Among them are the indescribable beauty of snow petrels and penguin nesting sites, demonstrating remarkable opportunities for survival in a country where people have only temporary stops.

The coastal part of the entire continent (around the pole) is occupied by colonies of two species of polar penguins: the huge emperor penguin and the medium-sized Adélie penguin. These fabulous birds are endowed with absolutely everything to not only live in the snow in severe frosts, sometimes over 60 ° C, in hurricane winds, but also to hatch and raise chicks. In addition, these birds spend most of their lives in ice water. In order to feed on the “plankton pastures” of surface currents, they can cover long distances in their aquatic wanderings.

Penguins are usually trusting and are not at all afraid of people. If they appear near their colony, then a small group of penguins always slowly comes out to meet the arrivals, as if welcoming the guests. The owners do not show surprise, although they examine the newcomers with some curiosity.

The gullibility of penguins is so great that they even allow penguin chicks to be held in their arms, and only look incredulously as if something had happened. Penguins themselves are regular guests of polar explorers, but they do not develop friendships with dogs.

Ability to orient and navigate. The large flightless inhabitants of Antarctica, penguins, have to gather in groups and travel hundreds of kilometers on foot to their Antarctic pastures or nesting sites. At the same time, they are able to conquer huge snowdrifts and mountain-shaped ice hummocks, perfectly orienting themselves in the endless frosty desert. In addition, the parents caring for the only chick, taking turns to feed in the ocean, must return back exactly on time. Otherwise, the chick can easily die of hunger even with a slight delay. To do this, penguins need to choose the shortest path through monotonous snow fields and ice.

Penguins, like a very wide range of animals, use sunlight to navigate. These inhabitants of the coastal zone know exactly the direction to the shore or to the water. Thanks to the sun-compass orientation, they strictly follow the desired route and only on cloudy days do they sometimes go astray.

To use the solar compass, penguins, like many migratory animals, are given complex navigational “devices.” After all, they orient their course relative to the azimuth of the Sun - the line of intersection of the solar vertical and the horizon plane in a single celestial sphere.

To test the ability of penguins to navigate by the sun's clock, they were taken from their nesting sites in a closed container 200 kilometers away and landed in the Antarctic plain without any landmarks. After moving, such a penguin “came to its senses” for some time, turned its head and looked around the unfamiliar place. Then, having chosen a direction, he confidently set off. The scientists followed the penguin, observing it through binoculars.

The penguin walked along a short and correctly chosen path while the sun was shining in the sky. When the sun was hidden in the clouds, he began to wander. But as soon as the sun came out of the clouds, the penguin’s path again lay directly on the map. After a certain time, all the penguins, having overcome snow plains that were completely identical in appearance, invariably came to their nesting site, and by the shortest route.

Penguin travelers. All winter, excellent swimmers of Adélie penguins fish in the ocean among the pack ice, up to 700 kilometers from their nesting grounds. And they raise their young in Antarctica and on the islands closest to it during the short polar summer. And in order to have time to raise their offspring, penguins set off on their journey in the very early spring. Researchers attached miniature radio transmitters to some penguins, which helped reveal the routes of their long-distance wanderings.

Many of them walk across the snow and ice of Antarctica in long, organized lines. Penguins walk on crust and loose snowdrifts, roll on their bellies along slopes, regulating their movement with their wings. It is interesting that when two such groups of travelers meet in the endless snow, the joy of the birds knows no end. Although future parents rush to their old nests, they spare no time for friendly greetings. Will stand in common noisy crowd, they will shout, raising their beaks to the sky, again line up one after another and continue the difficult path in their previous column.

In an experiment similar to the one described above, Adélie penguins, who were released 2,200 kilometers (!) 10 months after being transported, returned on foot to their home colony in McMurdo Sound. A case of transcontinental passage of these penguins to their native shores after they were specially brought to the other end of Antarctica has been recorded. Having covered 4,500 km (!) of the icy route, every single one of them returned home - some earlier, some later.

Reproductive behavior. Penguins are monogamous, and their education permanent couples preceded by an elaborate courtship ceremony. They usually live in schools at sea, and on land during breeding - in large colonies of hundreds and thousands of individuals each. These birds, depending on the species, build nests from pebbles or dig a small hole where they lay 2-3 eggs. A emperor and king penguins they do without a nest, and take turns carrying the only egg and the baby on their paws. As a rule, incubation lasts about a month, only for the emperor penguin it is 62-66 days, and for the king penguin it is 54 days.

Penguin nesting sites are often hundreds of kilometers away from the water. When, after a long hike, the penguins reach their native places, they begin mating games and courtship. Surprisingly, upon returning to the nesting site, the spouses easily find each other after a long separation. Moreover, their loyalty is such that if one of them came later and the previous partner had already managed to “woo,” then the new “family duet” is dissolved. Penguin weddings last over three weeks. According to descriptions by naturalists, during this period penguins can, stretching their necks like a swan, “sing serenades” that do not stop either day or night. Or the “lovers” are ready to sit motionless opposite each other for hours, with their eyes closed.

In the courtship ritual, some penguins use “gifts” for the bride, combined with benefits for future joint construction: the bachelor male finds small stones and places them at the feet of the prospective wife. If his gift is accepted, the pair builds a nest from this pile of pebbles. They surround the hole with a small rampart of stones and are vigilant to ensure that the neighbors do not steal the stones. And although penguin nest building is instinctive, knowing the optimal size of stones to choose comes with experience. Sometimes inexperienced males try to use several large stones, but in such a nest it will be completely uncomfortable to sit.

However, not all penguins nest on the surface of the earth. Thus, Magellanic penguins make nests in shallow burrows, where they are better protected from the elements and from enemies, including mammals and other birds.

The father is the “mother hen” and the breadwinner. Emperor penguins demonstrate an amazing example of parental behavior. They nest right on the ice, sheltered from the wind under the icy eaves of icebergs, and always lay their eggs in the middle of the harshest Antarctic winter - and this is in the coldest place on the planet! How do parents know when to lay eggs? The fact is that they themselves do not choose the time for nesting or laying eggs, since the entire routine of their lives is genetically programmed and reflected both in the structure and functioning of the body, and in behavior. In this particular case, the extremely short Arctic summer is taken into account; if penguins of this species do not lay eggs in winter, their chicks will not be strong enough to survive the next winter.

In a family of emperor penguins, as a result of almost a month of courtship, a single egg appears. He is greeted with joyful shouts, as if congratulating each other on this long-awaited event. It is customary for the father to take care of the egg, which is dear to the parents.

Since birds of these species do not build nests, the female transfers the laid egg from her paws to the paws of the male after a few hours, and tries to do this quickly so that the egg does not cool down. And she does this very carefully, because if the fragile egg is dropped, the spark of life in it will die. The male accepts the precious gift with special ceremonies. From time immemorial, every penguin of this species, receiving an egg, bows to the penguin, flaps its wings and shakes its tail. Then, with gentle movements of his beak, he rolls the egg onto his paws and covers it with a thick blanket - his fat fold. An egg will not fall out of such a warm “pocket,” not only when the father moves around in a crowd of fellow tribesmen in search of a warmer place, but even if he scratches his head with one of his paws.

While the father is holding the egg on his paws, he does not eat anything, and around - pitch darkness, the temperature can drop to minus 57 °C.

And after handing over the egg, the penguin goes to distant clearings among the ice to fatten up on fish. She is not afraid for her future offspring, since parental instinct forces the father to replace her during this time. He nurses the egg for over two months until the fluffy but helpless chick hatches, which he will continue to hold and warm in the same way. But now the next stage of caring for the baby, programmed in the hereditary program, comes into force - it is necessary to feed the baby. This lasts until the wife returns from a long journey, who is absent for about 70 days, to, in turn, go to sea to feed.

And what does the father feed the new baby before his wife arrives? It turns out that in order to feed the baby penguin, the penguin's stomach and esophagus begin to produce a milk-like mush. Such “bird milk”, like that of pigeons and flamingos, is very nutritious: it contains 8 times more fat (28%) than cow's milk, and proteins - 15 (up to 60%).

Finally, in a solemn procession, the noticeably plumper parents return to their legal spouses and the native chicks they saved, sometimes traveling up to 100 kilometers across the ice in complete darkness. Moreover, each of them immediately unmistakably finds its family in a giant colony of birds. It's hard to imagine how they manage to do this. Some scientists believe that the female finds her mate by her voice. But at this time there is such a hubbub over the nesting area - thousands of birds scream, worry, bow, jump with chicks on their paws.

How do females know when to return? After all, if they didn’t appear in certain moment, and the spouses and chicks will die of hunger. If the life of penguins had not been distinguished by such clarity and coherence from the first days of their existence, then there would not be a single emperor penguin left on Earth!

Next, the males, having lost half their weight during a three- to four-month fast in the frosty wind, hand the chicks over to their mothers. The cubs are immediately transferred to their paws and fall into the down pocket. Then the babies feed for two to three weeks on what the mother dispenses piecemeal from the stomach. In their stretchable crop, each of them brought quite a lot of gruel from krill (small crustaceans) and fish. And until the male returns from “fishing” (after a month and a half), the female feeds the chick with the food she brought and then “milk” almost every hour. And the chick gains several kilograms by the time his father returns.

Then the parents take turns going for food. Young penguins go to sea only at the beginning of next winter, when they are strong enough to feed on their own.

Collective education. When a five-week-old chick feels cramped in his pocket, he steps on the snow with his untested paws for the first time. Then, clumsily hobbling, all the penguins, in response to the hereditary program for their further development, go into "kindergarten". Adult birds, including single ones, take part in its creation so that they do not remain “out of work”, and they perform the functions of educators, protecting the young and keeping order in the children’s group. Such an organized gathering of children is fully justified by its expediency.

Firstly, parents need to go to the sea for prey in order to continue feeding their children. Having returned, each of them also finds their little penguin in the screaming and din among thousands of other people's chicks. A hungry baby greedily crawls its beak into the open throat of its parent to eat the prescribed portion of the white mush.

Secondly, hundreds of peers huddle together in dense groups, warming each other in bad weather and cruel, freezing winds.

Thirdly, around " kindergarten“There are adult penguins, which, forming a protective rampart, protect the babies from large birds hunting for them and from strong winds.

Having reached the age of five months, penguin chicks no longer need parental care. With the arrival of spring, and then summer, the ice floes begin to melt and crumble - it is on them that the young penguins, having left the “kindergartens” and changed their downy outfit, swim into the sea. Adults also go there to support their grown-up children during their internship.

Social behavior. Most penguins form colonies of hundreds or even thousands of birds during the breeding season. A colony (from the Latin colonia - settlement) is a group of cohabiting individuals of the same species that are able to live independently, but benefit from uniting in the struggle for existence. In harsh polar conditions, a penguin colony has a number of genetically determined advantages over a single family living. They are able not only to create “kindergartens”, but also to collect food together or organize joint warming. Thus, emperor penguins and their chicks huddle together in bad weather, and in the center of such a cluster the temperature becomes 10 °C higher than at the edges. The constant rotation of birds, when they change places, moving from the outer layers to the center, allows the members of the colony to withstand even the most unfavorable weather conditions.

Lifestyle of golden-haired penguins. Golden-haired penguins are distinguished by their original social behavior; they have bright yellow eyebrows in the form of wonderful tufted panicles pasted above their eyes.

The life of their colony, which nests on steep coastal cliffs, follows a strict schedule. Exactly at 7 o'clock in the morning, a loud cry of the leader - the strongest and oldest male - is heard in the golden-haired colony. No matter how the elements behave at this time, he calls on his fellow tribesmen to leave their nests and form a column. Of course, the birds really don’t want to leave their homes, but they have to, since the leader is relentless. He stands on a stone near the trodden path to the sea and screams invitingly until all his relatives hobble to the path. The penguins line up dejectedly at the back of each other's heads and wait patiently. Finally, the leader gives a signal, and the column disciplinedly heads to the sea to feed. This happens every day according to a once and for all established routine. The penguins also return from their catch in an orderly manner - at 4 pm.

Golden-haired penguins are also called rock climbers. After all, they take materials for building nests - seaweed washed ashore - from the very edge of the sea. With these “building materials,” the penguins have to climb a rocky slope for a long time to the nesting site, patiently clinging with their wings to barely noticeable ledges and cracks in the rock. Since this is difficult and troublesome, some penguins make their life easier by stealing a bunch of two from a neighbor. Such a deceiver will slowly steal someone else’s material and quickly crush it under himself. And when the neighbor notices the loss and starts making noise, he, like a guilty person, makes astonished eyes - he has nothing to do with it.

Enemies of the colony. A disaster for penguin communities is the great skua, one of the largest representatives of the gull family. Living on the coast of Antarctica, it constantly accompanies large colonies of Adélie penguins and steals their eggs and fragile chicks. Skuas, due to their territorial instinct, divide such a colony into sections and plunder exclusively within the boundaries of their family holdings. And those skuas who fail to stake out a plot of land in the penguin colony in time settle at a distance and are forced to earn their living by fishing.

When protecting babies and eggs from these worst enemies, the penguin uses its main weapon - its flippers. Even a person can feel the force of such a rebuff, since a backhand blow, even on a foot shod with high boots or high boots, is quite sensitive. And if he hits the arm that is not protected by clothing with all his penguin strength, then a dislocation or fracture is guaranteed.

Side by side with penguins, which form huge nesting colonies on the islands of the Subantarctic, snowy plovers, unique representatives of waders, also live. They behave like real parasites. In order not to starve and raise chicks, each pair of plovers “monopolizes” from 200 to 300 pairs of penguins. These birds can sometimes steal an egg or a small penguin. But the main source of food for adult plovers and their chicks is a kind of gruel of semi-digested crustaceans, which penguins feed their offspring.

Interestingly, calm penguins do not pay attention to plovers, and therefore they behave incredibly impudently. When the penguin passes food to the chick from beak to beak, the plover, sometimes sitting on the shoulder of a tall penguin, simply snatches the food from its beak. Therefore, the food of plover chicks sometimes consists of 90% of nutritious gruel obtained in this way. However, the losses of penguins are not so great - they amount to about 1% of the total mass of food delivered from the ocean to the colony.

The nesting success of a pair of plovers, like skuas, is determined, in addition to impudence in behavior, by their ability to capture and defend in skirmishes with other contenders an area with a sufficiently large population of penguins.

Penguins are birds that live in Antarctica and very cold areas of the globe. Penguins are the only wingless waterfowl that cannot fly. Some species spend almost their entire lives in water, coming to land to lay eggs and wait for offspring. People living far from penguin habitats have only general idea, do not know about the features that distinguish penguins from other birds, about the processes of their life. One such process is reproduction.

So, how do penguins mate? The breeding season for penguins begins in the summer, they come onto land and head to the breeding sites, and they always prefer the same breeding sites. Having arrived at the breeding site, penguins begin searching for partners. Having formed pairs, they remain faithful to each other throughout the breeding season. ;Before mating, a courtship process takes place for a month, in which a special place is given to songs. The songs are accompanied by mating dances, after which the female lies down on the ground, the male climbs on her back and the birds mate. Mating lasts approximately 4-6 seconds, after which the male moves off the female.

No less interesting is the question of how penguins speak. Penguins, like many other birds, communicate using sound signals. While penguins are underwater, they make almost no sounds. But during the breeding season, when they come to land, they communicate using cries reminiscent of the sounds of a trumpet or rattle. ;Penguins communicate with each other by shaking their heads and wings, bowing, calling, emitting a characteristic cry. During penguin breeding, a special place is given to songs; this is necessary so that the partners remember each other’s voices well and do not get lost in a large colony.

Speaking of reproduction, we must mention how penguins hatch eggs. Male penguins hatch the eggs, while females swim away to get food. Penguins do not build nests, so the male incubates the egg in the following way: he places the egg on his paws and covers it with the fold of his belly. To prevent the egg from falling, penguins move with mincing steps. Thus, the male incubates the egg until the chick hatches; at the time of hatching, the female returns with a full crop of prey.

Since penguins spend most of their lives in water, the question arises: how do penguins sleep? Penguins sleep standing up, huddled in flocks to keep it warm, every 3 minutes, they collide with each other with dull blows. During sleep, penguins hold an egg or chick on their paws, so they wake up abruptly when their paws are touched. In addition, penguins wake up if a bird weighing more than 800 grams sits on its back; a penguin will also wake up if an egg or chick rolls off its paws.

Penguins are waterfowl, I wonder how penguins swim? Despite the fact that on land penguins are very clumsy and clumsy, in water they move very deftly and quickly - at a speed of 5-10 km/h, sometimes even faster. Most quick way movement - swim in the same way as a dolphin - periodically jumping out of the water, which reduces resistance to the current. ;The emperor penguin moves very quickly, which occurs due to the formation of small bubbles. It can be said that penguins have many interesting and cognitive characteristics that distinguish them from other birds,

A penguin is a flightless bird that belongs to the order Penguinidae, family Penguinidae (lat. Spheniscidae).

The origin of the word “penguin” has 3 versions. The first involves a combination of the Welsh words pen (head) and gwyn (white), which originally referred to the now extinct great auk. Due to the similarity of the penguin with this bird, the definition was transferred to it. According to the second option, the name of the penguin was given by English word pinwing, translated meaning “hairpin wing”. The third version is the Latin adjective pinguis, meaning “fat.”

Penguin - description, characteristics, structure.

All penguins can swim and dive excellently, but they cannot fly at all. On land, the bird looks rather clumsy due to the structural features of the body and limbs. The penguin has a streamlined body shape with highly developed muscles of the pectoral keel, which often makes up a quarter of the total mass. The penguin's body is quite plump, slightly compressed laterally and covered with feathers. The not too large head is located on a mobile, flexible and rather short neck. The penguin's beak is strong and very sharp.

As a result of evolution and lifestyle, the penguin's wings have changed into elastic flippers: when swimming underwater, they rotate in the shoulder joint like a screw. The legs are short and thick, have 4 toes, connected by swimming membranes. Unlike other birds, the penguin's legs are significantly moved back, which forces the bird to keep its body strictly vertical while on land.

To maintain balance, the penguin is helped by a short tail, consisting of 16-20 hard feathers: if necessary, the bird simply leans on it, like on a stand.

The penguin's skeleton does not consist of hollow tubular bones, which is usual for other birds: the structure of the penguin's bones is more reminiscent of the bones of marine mammals. For optimal thermal insulation, the penguin has an impressive reserve of fat with a layer of 2-3 centimeters.

The plumage of penguins is dense and dense: individual small and short feathers cover the body of the bird like a tile, protecting it from getting wet in cold water. The color of the feathers in all species is almost identical - a dark (usually black) back and a white belly.

Once a year, a penguin molts: new feathers grow from at different speeds, pushing out the old feather, so often the bird during the molting period has an unkempt, ragged appearance. During molting, penguins are only on land, try to hide from gusts of wind and eat absolutely nothing.

The sizes of penguins differ depending on the species: for example, the emperor penguin reaches 117-130 cm in length and weighs from 35 to 40 kg, and the little penguin has a body length of only 30-40 cm, while the penguin weighs 1 kg.

In search of food, penguins are able to spend quite a lot of time under water, plunging into its thickness to 3 meters and covering distances of 25-27 km. The speed of a penguin in water can reach 7-10 km per hour. Some species dive to depths reaching 120-130 meters. During the period when penguins are not preoccupied with mating games and caring for their offspring, they move quite far from the coast, swimming out to sea at a distance of up to 1000 km.

On land, when it is necessary to move quickly, the penguin lies on its belly and, pushing off with its limbs, quickly slides along the ice or snow. With this method of movement, penguins reach speeds of 3 to 6 km/h.

The lifespan of a penguin in nature is 15-25 years or more. In captivity ideal content For birds, this figure sometimes increases to 30 years.

Enemies of penguins in nature.

Unfortunately, the penguin has enemies in its natural habitat. They happily peck at penguin eggs, and the helpless chicks are a tasty prey for the skua. Navy SEALs, killer whales, leopard seals and sea lions hunt penguins in the sea. They won’t refuse to diversify their menu with a plump penguin and.

What do penguins eat?

Penguins eat fish, crustaceans, plankton and small cephalopods. The bird happily eats krill, anchovies, Antarctic silverfish, small octopuses and squid. During one hunt, a penguin can make from 190 to 800-900 dives: this depends on the type of penguin, climatic conditions and food needs. Oral apparatus The bird works on the principle of a pump: through its beak it sucks in small prey along with water. On average, birds swim about 27 kilometers during feeding and spend about 80 minutes a day at a depth of more than 3 meters.

The geographical distribution of these birds is quite extensive, but they prefer cool conditions. Penguins live in cold zones of the Southern Hemisphere; their concentrations are mainly observed in Antarctica and the Subantarctic region. They also live in southern Australia and South Africa, and are found along almost the entire coastline of South America - from the Falkland Islands to the territory of Peru, and near the equator they live in the Galapagos Islands.

Types of penguins, photos and names.

The modern classification of penguins includes 6 genera and 19 species. Below are descriptions of several varieties:

  • - this is the largest and heaviest penguin: the weight of the male reaches 40 kg with a body length of 117-130 cm, the females are somewhat smaller - with a height of 113-115 cm they weigh on average 32 kg. The plumage on the back of the birds is black, the belly is white, and in the neck area there are characteristic spots of orange or bright yellow. Emperor penguins live on the coast of Antarctica.

  • very similar to the emperor penguin, but differs from it in its more modest size and feather color. The size of the king penguin varies from 90 to 100 cm. The weight of the penguin is 9.3-18 kg. In adult individuals, the back is dark gray, sometimes almost black, the abdomen is white, and there are bright orange spots on the sides of the dark head and in the chest area. The habitats of this bird are the South Sandwich Islands, Tierra del Fuego Islands, Crozet, Kerguelen, South Georgia, Macquarie, Heard, Prince Edward, and the coastal waters of Lusitania Bay.

  • - a medium-sized bird. The length of the penguin is 65-75 cm, weight is about 6 kg. The back is black, the belly is white, the distinctive feature is a ring white around the eyes. Adélie penguins live in Antarctica and the adjacent island territories: Orkney and South Shetland Islands.

  • – an endangered species. The length of the bird is approximately 55 cm, the average weight is about 3 kg. The eyes are red, the belly is white, the wings and back are gray-black. Yellow eyebrows blend smoothly into tufts of yellow feathers located to the side of the eyes. Black feathers stick out on the penguin's head. This species differs from the southern crested penguin (lat. Eudyptes chrysocome) by shorter feathers and narrower eyebrows. The bulk of the population lives on the islands of Gough, Impregnable and Tristan da Cunha, located in the southern Atlantic Ocean.

  • has the typical coloring of all penguins, but differs in one feature in appearance: this penguin has a spectacular tuft of golden feathers above its eyes. Body length varies between 64-76 cm, maximum weight is a little over 5 kg. Golden-haired penguins live along the southern shores of the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic, are slightly less common in the northern part of Antarctica and Tierra del Fuego, and nest on other islands of the Sub-Antarctic.

  • - the largest penguin in size after the emperor and king. The length of the bird reaches 70-90 cm, the weight of the penguin is from 7.5 to 9 kg. The black back and white belly are the typical color of birds of this species; the beak and legs are colored orange-red. The penguins' habitat is limited to Antarctica and the islands of the Subantarctic zone (Prince Edward Island, South Sandwich and Falkland Islands, Heard Island, Kerguelen, South Georgia, South Orkney Islands).

  • has a body length of 70-80 cm and a weight of about 5-6 kg. The color of the plumage is typical for all penguin species, the peculiarity is 1 or 2 black stripes in the neck area. Magellanic penguins nest on the Patagonian coast, on the Juan Fernandez and Falkland Islands, and small groups live in southern Peru and Rio de Janeiro.

  • reaches a height of 60-70 cm and weighs no more than 4.5 kg. The back and head are dark gray, the penguin's belly is white. A black stripe runs down the head. Chinstrap penguins live on the coast of Antarctica and the islands adjacent to the continent. They are also found on icebergs in Antarctica and the Falkland Islands.

  • spectacled penguin, aka donkey penguin, black-footed penguin or African penguin (lat. Spheniscus demersus) reaches a length of 65-70 centimeters and weighs from 3 to 5 kg. A distinctive feature of the bird is a narrow black stripe, bending in the shape of a horseshoe and running along the belly - from the chest to the paws. The spectacled penguin lives on the coast of Namibia and South Africa, nesting along the coastline of islands with the cold Bengal Current.

  • - the smallest penguin in the world: the bird is 30-40 cm tall and weighs about 1 kg. The back of the small penguin is colored blue-black or dark gray, the chest area and the upper part of the legs are white or light gray. Penguins live on the coast of South Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand and the adjacent islands of Stuart and Chatham.