Tuesday, July 26, 2016

Trio of penguin chicks take first steps out of nest at Cotswold Wildlife Park


/ Megan Archer, Reporter covering Witney & West Oxfordshire
A TRIO of penguin chicks born at Cotswold Wildlife Park have taken their first tentative steps out of the nest.
The three Humboldt Penguin chicks have spent more than two months inside their nests, and first out of the cost hide was Peanut, hatched to parents DJ and Mrs Doyle.
A few days later, the park's oldest penguin, Mushy, 24, produced two chicks with father Wonky.
Sadly, due to an age-related illness, Wonky is now rearing his chicks alone.


Named Basil and MJ by keepers, the two female chicks are healthy and developing well under the watchful eye of their father.
Humboldt Penguins are one of the world's 17 penguin species and they live along the South American coastline of Peru and Chile.
In the wild, these boisterous birds nest in the driest desert on earth, the Atacama. This species was originally named after the cold water current it swims in, which itself is named after Alexander von Humboldt – Prussian geographer, naturalist and explorer.
They are becoming increasingly rare and are listed as vulnerable on the International Union of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species.

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