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Penguins catch their food in the water.Open or Close
They catch the food using their beaks and swallow it whole.
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The largest penguins are the Emperor Penguins.Open or Close
They can be 3ft 7 inches tall and weigh 75 pounds.
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penguins drink salt water.Open or Close
Penguins have a gland in their body that acts like a filter to separate the salt from the water.
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Penguins take very good care of their eggs.Open or Close
After the female penguin lays her egg she goes out to look for food. The male penguin will sit on the egg to protect it until she returns. When she comes back he leaves to look for food.
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A baby penguin is called a chick.Open or Close
and when they hatch and live with the other chicks they live in a creche.
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The chick will eat regurgitated food from their mother.Open or Close
Regurgitated food is food that comes out of the mother’s stomach.
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Penguins are social animals.Open or Close
Penguins often nest with other penguins.
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No penguins live in the North Pole!.Open or Close
No Polar bears live in the South Pole, so polar bears and penguins can't be friends.
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Penguins can be playful.Open or Close
They like to go tobogganing. They will lay on their tummy and slide through the ice and snow. Penguins will also dive off cliffs into the water, get out and dive again for fun.
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When penguins find mates they sing to each other.Open or Close
This way they learn to recognise each others voices.
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Larger penguins live in colder climates.Open or Close
and smaller penguins live in warmer climates.
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The smallest penguins are the Little Blue Penguins also known as Fairy Penguins.Open or Close
They are only 16 inches tall and weigh 2 ½ pounds!, oh and they live in Southern Australia and New Zealand.
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Penguins are birds.Open or Close
but their wings have evolved into flippers so they cannot fly.
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There are 17 species of penguin.Open or Close
and they all live in the Southern hemisphere.
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Can you remember all the species of Penguin?.Open or Close
Adelie, African, Chinstrap, Emperor, Erect Crested, Fiordland, Galapagos, Gentoo, Humboldt, King, Little (or Blue), Macaroni, Magellanic, Rockhopper, Royal, Snares and Yellow eyed.
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Penguins cannot breathe underwater.Open or Close
but they can hold their breath for a very long time.
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Penguins have backward facing bristles on their tongues.Open or Close
this stops their slippery food from getting away.
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Once a penguin finds a mate, they usually stay together for years.Open or Close
for as long as they have chicks.
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When penguins are ready to mate, the male stands with his back arched and wings stretched.Open or Close
He makes a loud call and struts about to attract a female.
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During the mating season penguins head for special nesting areas on the shore.Open or Close
The area where penguins mate, nest and raise their chicks is called a "rookery".
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Rockhopper penguins build their nests on steep rocky areas.Open or Close
To get there, they hold both feet together and bounce from ledge to ledge.
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Magellanic penguins dig burrows under the ground.Open or Close
to form huge "cities" similar to gophers.
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Adelies and chinstrap penguins use rocks to build their nests.Open or Close
The perfect rock is a rare commodity for these birds. They'll often fight over or steal each other's stones!.
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When the chick hatches, it immediately starts calling.Open or Close
so that its parents will learn to recognize its voice.
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Emperor penguins spend their entire lives in Antarctica.Open or Close
This is the Earth's southernmost continent where temperatures can drop to as low as -60°C.
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Around April every year (the start of the Antarctic winter) emperor penguins meet to breed on the thick Antarctic ice.Open or Close
By the time the female lays her egg (usually around June), she's worked up a big appetite! She passes the egg to the male before journeying up to 80km to the open ocean where she can feed her hungry tummy on fish, squid and krill.
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today emperor penguins are considered near threatened.Open or Close
It's feared that rising temperatures due to global warming will reduce their breeding ground, and overfishing will mean less food for them to eat.