Penguins in the UK

Penguins in the UK
21-04-2008

I briefly worked with penguins a long time ago, and back then it seemed easier for collections to acquire pretty much whatever they wanted. I can't work out whether the situation today is due to more focus on jackass/humboldt penguin breeding programmes eclipsing the more difficult species, or whether the other species have just either died of (very) old age or become inbred slightly causing breeding rates to decline. It seems strange that two species should do so well all over the UK, while the others species all have just one collection breeding each of them (Living Coasts - macaronis, Whipsnade-rockhoppers, Edinburgh-gentoos, Birdland-kings). At Edinburgh, the kings and rockhoppers haven't bred for a year or two as far as I know, and ISIS lists a gender bias greatly towards males. Also, there are collections where the more difficult ones are kept in dwindling numbers without ever I think successfully breeding them (Twycross, bristol).

I wanted to start a thread to share and maybe hear other members' knowledge of the history of these birds in british collections over the last few years. I was surprised to hear that Hillside had bred kings, rockhoppers and macaronis only around 5 or 6 years ago. I think the UK needs another first class penguin facility, and hopefully that's what blackbrook is becoming, with proven past expertise. Living coasts has turned out to be doing well with Macaroni penguins, but appeared to move it's gentoos to edinburgh due the the climate being inappropriate. Maybe this is what happened to Bristol's gentoo penguins after the seal and penguin coasts opened? In the 1990s, Bristol had kings, rockhoppers, macaronis and gentoos in the old pool by the monkey temple, and a separate enclosure where the pudus are now. I understand that the blue penguins didn't survive the current exhibit either. I don't know that they have ever successfully hatched anything but Jackass penguins, despite holding so many species over the last 20 years.

Belfast, not long after building their penguin exhibit, brought in a large number of eggs from the falkland islands, and hatched a number of magellanic, king, and rockhopper penguins from these, plus they still have a few gentoos. As far as I know all but a few rockhoppers and gentoos are gone. Could the lack of breeding success be due to nearly all of these birds having been hatched and hand-reared around the same time, rather than being reintroduced into an adult colony?

Is there a case to be made against mixing the more robust penguin species, which breed well and are normally exhibited in large colonies, with small numbers of rockhoppers/gentoos etc, as it seems a trend for zoos to want to have something 'exotic' alongside the humboldt's and jackass groups? Humboldt's and Jackass penguins don't nest in the open and I have seen them disturb rockhoppers trying to nest in the same enclosure. Also, would anyone know why Whipsnade are sending their rockhopper chicks to London? Does it improve or hinder the breeding efforts of the adults if the chicks stay with the group the next year to swell numbers? I can't help but think that London have just decided they want a second penguin species in the newer exhibit, but I wonder if they'll ever breed in there.

The irony is that the success of humboldt and jackass breeding programmes means that there is a need for facilities to house surplus birds, and this also makes it easier to acquire them, as the number of recent, decidedly average, penguin facilities at a number of coastal aquaria shows.

21-04-2008

At belfast we have bred kings, gentoo, rock hopper and humboldt succesfully. Our last magellanic died about three years ago sadly. Our gentoos breed every year but we have only one male who mates with three females. The young however have been lost due to the fact the generally hatch in the hottest part of the yer and cant cope with the heat. Two females are currently sitting on three eggs at the moment and we will atempt to hand rear chicks this year.

21-04-2008

That's interesting, and good to know you bred from your Rockhoppers. The enclosure is still one of the best in this country. Perhaps the breeding season for gentoos is why some of the southern zoos have sent their penguins north. Did you ever breed from your king or magellanic penguins? (A weird question I know as they were hatched from eggs at the zoo).

21-04-2008

Yes i know we bred our kings at least once the group was very promising until we had vandals break in and beat up some of the kings and even threw one of them in with the lions. The flock was never the same after that and it was decided to send the remaining animals to rotterdam. I will have to ask about the magallenics!

21-04-2008

The people who did that to the King penguins are monsters. That is disgusting!

King Penguins.
21-04-2008

I remember seeing a King Penguin chick(s) at Bristol- very many years ago-so they have bred them in the long distant past. At one time Bristol had a lot of trouble with foxes and the penguins were a target- the foxes would access the enclosure by coming along the wall and down the 'cliff' at the back of the exhibit.. they used to hang lanterns out at night to try and frighten them off. Bristol's penguins gradually declined in number and variety, possibly primarily as a result of fox predation. (Bristol had a big urban fox population at one time).

It seems harder nowadays to find King penguins in our zoos. I can remember when many zoos had them and the familiar 'trumpeting' call. I have a number of postcards of older penguin exhibits in zoos and many include a small group of Kings. Both Whipsnade & London have bred them in the past. I was sorry to see them disappear from Whipsnade in particular, was it around the 1980's(?). I read somewhere on this Forum that this is a species declining rapidly in zoos almost everywhere.

Whipsnade Kings
21-04-2008

Whupsnade had King Penguins until the early 2000s when the enclosure was rennovated and the remaining animals sent to Rotterdam (I think).

21-04-2008

Any idea how many were left at Whipsnade by the end? Sounds like Rotterdam has been amassing Kings from other collections.

21-04-2008

Apparantly so, but Rotterdam's group is by no means exceptionally large, nor exceptionally succesfull. As far as i know there's been 2, perhaps 3 chicks since the exhibit was opened in around 2000...

The situation in Antwerp is also bad, but different since they only have one female. She produced, i believe, two chicks in the last few years of which one was another female.

Stuttgart allready said they were phasing them out, they only have 4 individuals left. The park said they were going to spent the rest of their lives being "retired" in a (rather crappy) exhibit at Stuttgart, rather then sending them to the brand new (being build now) exhibit in Wuppertal. Maybe they'll change their mind when it's finished though...

21-04-2008

I think all these small groups of King Penguins should be assembled together into larger flocks at two or three zooswith the best facilities for them. A far better chance of an improved breeding rate then...

21-04-2008

So have Wuppertal just assembled a group, or are these an existing successful colony that have just been given a new exhibit?

I didn't realise about the bristol foxes and the vandals at belfast. That's horrific. No wonder they were send to other collections.

I also remember King penguins at Chessington until there was only one left in the late 1980s. The last I saw of him was inside the old hippo shed while the new bird garden was being built after the original site was used for another ride.

It does seem that some zoos will hang on to small groups of more unusual species, rather than send them to locations where they are more likely to breed, although its encouraging to hear that belfast and whipsnade's king penguins didn't just die out.

What is causing the gender bias in some penguin groups? I wonder if there will ever be another license for further egg collecting from the falklands. With increasing threats to wild stocks, it seems one of the most sensible ways to sustain captive groups given that previous expeditions collected only eggs that had been laid too late for the chicks to survive.

Hopefully some good things will happen at Blackbrook....

21-04-2008

They have an existing colony, but i don't know wheither it's very succesfull or not...

21-04-2008

I remember reading/hearing about the Belfast incident in the news.

If you've seen any of the(fairly)recent Bristol 'ZOO' T.V. series they evidently still have fox problems, one episode showed them herding the flamingoes indoors after a fox has taken a red-breasted goose. Its obviously still difficult to keep them out, even with devices like electric fencing on the walls etc as Clifton Downs is right across the road.

I have heard that Lion's dung can be an effective deterrent for foxes(or cats), and they do have plenty of that...

21-04-2008

Maybe 4 or 5.......not sure of the sex ratio though.

22-04-2008

I thought the flamingo exhibit had a mesh roof?