Photos: Rescued penguins star in new exhibit

Four penguins that were plucked, stranded and emaciated, from the Brazilian coast more than a year ago begin a new life as high-profile celebrities Thursday.

  

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A Magellanic penguin swims through a glass enclosure at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach Wednesday. Four of the 13 penguins now at the Aquarium were rescued after becoming stranded along the Brazilian coast.

PHOTO BY MARK RIGHTMIRE, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER, TEXT BY PAT BRENNAN

 

By PAT BRENNAN / ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
 

Four penguins that were plucked, stranded and emaciated, from the Brazilian coast more than a year ago begin a new life as high-profile celebrities Thursday.
The four Magellanic penguins join nine others at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, swimming, diving and waddling through a new exhibit meant to replicate their southern hemisphere habitat. The public gets its first look when the doors open at 9 a.m.

At a press preview Wednesday, the penguins bubbled over with personality, seeming as eager to play as curious children.
They swam toward onlookers and peered into camera lenses, and clambered out of the water and among the legs of photographers, stretching their necks to grab at camera straps.
"They tend to get really excited," said Michele Sousa, a senior biologist at the Aquarium, as she helped shepherd the penguins Wednesday. "They really like people at the window."
The rescued birds, now plump on fish, are named Avery, Roxy, Robbie and Kate; they and the other penguins, acquired from other zoos or aquariums, wear name bands on their upper wings.
Aquarium officials hope their new exhibit will not only make a splash with the public, but call attention to troubled and declining penguin populations around the world.
They say 75 percent of the world's penguins are threatened or endangered, and that scientific data points to overfishing, perhaps abetted by climate change, as the main cause of penguin decline.
The four rescued birds, in fact, might have been searching for food, winding up on the Brazilian coast far to the north of their normal range near the southern tip of South America.
Rescuers caught them near Niteroi, not far from Rio de Janeiro.
The birds began to thrive soon after arriving at the Aquarium in April 2011, said assistant curator Rob Mortensen.
That included reproduction. Six of the penguins are being kept "behind the scenes," where they are tending eggs or chicks.
Their new exhibit space has a glass enclosure for swimming. At one end is a crawlspace -- meant for children, but big enough for adults -- where visitors can view the penguins as they swim above as well as around them.
Beyond the water is a replica of a rocky beach, complete with simulated burrows that the penguins use for sleeping quarters.
Beginning June 2, visitors can get even closer to the penguins. They can schedule a time to go behind the scenes, feed the birds and interact with them.
The Aquarium charges $24.95 for adult admission, $13.95 for children; the behind-the-scenes, "Penguin Animal Encounter" will cost $90 per person.

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