Thursday, July 7, 2011

Happy Feet Tracked by Hawke's Bay Company

Happy Feet tracked by Hawke's Bay company


FAR FROM HOME: A GPS tracking device (inset) will be attached to Happy Feet when zoologists feel he is well enough to travel home to Antarctica.

FAR FROM HOME: A GPS tracking device (inset) will be attached to Happy Feet when zoologists feel he is well enough to travel home to Antarctica. Photo / Apn

Happy Feet the emperor penguin will take a piece of Hawke's Bay with him when he travels home to Antarctica.

A Havelock North firm is producing a tracking device to record the penguin's journey.

Happy Feet swam up onto a beach on the Kapiti Coast last month and was being cared for by Wellington Zoo.

Sirtrack CEO Mike Kelly said the company offered to make a device because it was an unusual case and a way to help. "It's really interesting. It's not often you get to track an emperor penguin off our coast," Mr Kelly said.

"It's a good way to demonstrate how our units work."

The company had previously made a tracker for Tarly the loggerhead turtle, which was found injured in Northland. The turtle made it all the way to Chile before the tracker stopped working.

The device was not permanent, it would fall off when Happy Feet moulted.

"It's taken several years to develop and it's now deployed all around the world," Mr Kelly said.

The company had offices in the US and distributors in Africa. They regularly worked with more than 70 countries supplying wildlife tracking devices for every kind of animal, from birds and reptiles to lions, tigers and bears.

A wildlife expert would attach the device, with guidance from Sirtrack, when Happy Feet was well enough to make the trip, Mr Kelly said.

"Happy Feet has to meet all his health checks and that decision will rest with the experts at Wellington Zoo."

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