- Saying Lorraine Kelly is penguin obsessed she says is an understatement
- She therefore was thrilled to take part in a new four part series about them
- Penguin A&E begins on Tuesday at 9pm on Channel 5
To
say Lorraine Kelly is obsessed with penguins would be something of an
understatement. ‘Look, here’s my penguin key ring that I keep all my
keys on,’ she says, emptying her handbag on to the sofa we’re sharing.
‘Here’s my penguin-shaped speaker, which I use for my music when I’m travelling. I’m even wearing penguin socks!’
She
also has a 5ft penguin statue named Pingu after the children’s cartoon
in her garden in Scotland, which her husband Steve bought her as a
birthday present.
Lorraine Kelly says that she is
obsessed with penguins and so jumped at the chance to make a four part
series about her favourite animal
He
faces south, she says, so he can look towards ‘home’ in Antarctica and
is a reminder for Lorraine of the strength of her marriage. ‘Penguins
are famously monogamous, and I love the fact they mate for life,’ she
explains.
‘There
are four penguin statues outside the Discovery Point museum in Dundee,
and I love them. Steve tracked down the artist and got him to make one
for me. It’s one of the most thoughtful presents I’ve ever had.’
So
when Lorraine was invited to make a four-part series called Penguin
A&E about a penguin rescue centre in South Africa, she naturally
jumped at the chance. ‘I don’t think they realised quite how much I love
them,’ she laughs.
‘They
may have had an inkling because there’s one at London Zoo named after
me, but they didn’t know how obsessed I am. It was just lucky and I
almost bit their hand off when they asked me.’
Penguin A&E centers around a penguin rescue centre in South Africa
Penguins
live almost exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere, primarily
Antarctica, although some species are found further north, closer to the
Equator.
Highly
adapted for life in the water, these flightless birds spend about half
of their lives on land and half in the oceans and their wings have
evolved into flippers. But penguins are facing all sorts of dangers –
especially in South Africa.
The
African penguin – also known as the jackass penguin – is now officially
classified as endangered because its population has plummeted in recent
years. There are now just over 20,000 breeding pairs left in South
Africa and 4,500 pairs in neighbouring Namibia, a decline of 61 per cent
in the past 28 years, as Lorraine discovered when she visited the
rescue centre in Cape Town to see the work being done by
conservationists to save them.
Sitting
in the shadow of Table Mountain, the facility is 40 miles from Boulders
Beach, where one of the biggest colonies of African penguins – more
than 3,000-strong – is based. The charity rescues all sorts of birds –
including pelicans and other sea birds – but its work with penguins is
arguably its most important, rescuing more than 1,500 each year. It has
an operating theatre, an intensive care unit, a rehab ward and a nursery
complete with incubator for rescued eggs.
‘We
deal with a lot of emergencies,’ says veterinarian Natasha Ayres. ‘We
have fractures, open wounds, dehydrated penguins, injuries caused by
dogs and fishing nets. We’ve had to amputate, but they seem to cope with
it remarkably well. They’re the funniest things too. When you’re having
the worst day, you can watch a penguin waddling around and it’s
hysterical. But they’re on the brink of extinction and anything we can
do, we should do.’
It
was a sobering experience for Lorraine. ‘These penguins live right on
the beach,’ she says, ‘and unfortunately when people and penguins come
into contact there’s only ever going to be one loser. People go onto the
beach with their dogs, and the dogs attack the penguins. Other penguins
swallow fishing hooks, or they wander onto the roads and get run over.
There are some truly terrible stories on the show. There was one penguin
that had lost an eye when it was bitten by a dog.’
This
was Nipper, who’d been shaken like a rag doll by the dog, causing
swelling around the brain. He almost drowned when staff tested out his
swimming skills and he was unable to stay afloat. Thankfully, after Dr
Ayres cleaned his wounds the pressure in his head was relieved and he’s
since been successfully re-released into the wild.
The
centre also has a roaming patrol team that looks for penguins nesting
in dangerous places at nearby colonies like Stony Point, such as close
to a busy road. They catch the penguins and move them to the beach where
it’s safer, and any stray eggs are taken back to the hospital so they
can be hatched safely.
Every year, the team raises hundreds
of chicks until they’re three months old when they’re released and this
year Lorraine joined them
Every
year, the team raises hundreds of chicks until they’re three months old
when they’re released. Because penguin chicks stay with their parents
for four months in the wild, the chicks are reliant on staff for
everything.
‘But
the bird can start to associate food and love with a person, not to
another penguin,’ says bird rehabilitator Marna Smit. ‘It’s called
imprinting, and if you release a penguin like that into the wild, it
won’t survive because its instinct is to go and find a person to feed
it, not to go and find fish in the ocean. Once imprinting happens it’s
difficult to reverse it, and sometimes impossible. So it’s always a good
feeling being able to hatch an egg here and follow it right through to
release. We enjoy the release as much as the penguin does.’
Because
of the danger of imprinting the penguins, Lorraine was not allowed to
touch any of the birds during her visit, which she found tough. ‘These
penguins love people,’ she says. ‘They’ll follow you around like wee
drunk men and they love anything shiny. If you’re wearing a ring they’ll
follow you as if to say, “Gimme that!” And they peck you to get your
attention. I’ve got a couple of bruises on my leg where they nipped me.
‘But
you can’t touch or stroke them because they’ll start to think you’re
their mummy, and then they can’t be released back into the wild. That
was the toughest thing for me, having this lovely fluffy thing next to
me, trying to attract my attention, and I couldn’t pick it up.’
Those
penguins that do have to stay at the centre live out their days in
luxury. ‘They have this huge pool they call the Five Star Hotel, and
honestly it’s fantastic,’ says Lorraine.
‘They
even have a bubble machine which they call the jacuzzi, and the
penguins get served sushi platters. Schoolchildren come to see them on
trips, and the penguins absolutely lap up the attention. They live the
life of Riley. Money is tight there, but the people who run it work
wonders.’
Lorraine
was so touched by her trip she’s adopted a penguin and named him Steve
after her husband. And she’s vowed to stay in touch with the centre to
find out the fates of the birds she met there.
‘These
little guys are funny and absolutely adorable, but they’re in trouble
so we need to help them. I really admire what the people at the centre
are doing, and I hope that by making this programme we can raise a bit
of awareness for them. That’s my aim.’
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