>
> Dear PenguinPromises
>
> The penguins have reached the coast of Brazil and will be having a great time.
> The sky is blue, the sun is shining, and the water is crystal clear. Catching
> fish is easy for Promises with such good sunshine and clear water.
>
> When Promises is home in the colony raising chicks, just one type of fish makes
> up 90% of the diet. The common name for those fish is Sprats, and the scientific
> name is “Sprattus fuegensis”. The reason that the penguins almost exclusively
> catch sprats here in the south is because they are very common in Patagonia,
> and live in large groups, called shoals.
>
> Because sprats live in shoals, the penguins are able to catch them quickly once
> they have located the shoal. The penguins swim around the shoal eating one fish
> after another, and can quickly catch enough to take back to the nest. Of course
> the shoals have millions of fish, and the penguins only eat a tiny fraction,
> otherwise living in shoals would make no sense for the fish.
>
> By contrast, fish that don’t live in shoals would take ages to catch in the open
> ocean. The penguins would have to look for them one fish at a time, which would
> take too long when there are hungry chicks back home waiting to be fed.
>
> In Brazil there are different types of fish to eat. Penguins are not picky about
> their food, and Promises will eat almost any fish that is small enough to be
> swallowed whole. Penguins do not have teeth, so they cannot chew their food.
> They must swallow the fish whole, and that means that the fish have to be the
> right size. For Promises, the size of the fish is more important than what species
> of fish it is.
>
> In Brazil the penguins eat many kinds of fish that are not found in Patagonia,
> including solitary fish that do not live in shoals. The penguins now live in
> the water all the time, so they do not have to waste time traveling to and from
> a nest each day to find the fish. They also have no chicks to feed and only need
> to catch enough food to feed themselves, so there is no rush. At this time of
> year Promises can easily catch enough food feeding on solitary fish that are
> not in shoals.
>
> The penguins are now spread out from southern Brazil to north of Rio de Janeiro.
> The Rio Times, which is the local newspaper in Rio de Janeiro, published an article
> saying that the “2021 Penguin Season” has begun. The article talks about the
> penguins arriving in the area on their winter migration.
>
> Penguins have no need to come ashore at this time of year. They have everything
> they need out at sea. Most people living in Brazil have never seen a penguin
> because the penguins stay away from the coast in open water. If the newspaper
> had not written the article, many people in Rio de Janeiro would be unaware that
> there are so many penguins just a short distance off the coast.
>
> If you wish to read the article you can find it at:
> https://riotimesonline.com/brazil-news/nosubscription/2021-penguin-season-begins-on-brazils-southern-and-southeastern-coasts/
>
> However the article is very misleading, talking about poor hungry penguins moving
> into an area where it is difficult to find enough food. That is simply untrue.
> Whilst it is true that the waters around Brazil are not as rich in fish as Patagonia,
> the penguins’ needs are also very different at this time of year as I mentioned
> above. With no chicks to feed, the penguins only need a few fish a day to be
> well fed.
>
> It is little use spending the winter in the south where there are more fish,
> when the days there are too short and gloomy for Promises to be able to see the
> fish deep underwater. That is why the penguins migrate to Brazil each year.
>
> The penguins swim a long way to leave the rich waters of Patagonia and spend
> the winter off the coast of Brazil. They would not do that if Brazil was unsuitable
> for their needs. The writer of the Rio Times article has assumed that all the
> penguins in Brazil are in the same condition as those that get washed ashore,
> which is not the case. To be fair it is just a newspaper, and does not pretend
> to be a scientific journal.
>
> With over four million penguins along the Brazilian coastline, it is not surprising
> that some penguins will get sick and die, but very few of those are adult penguins.
> The adult penguins find food easily in Brazil and do not loose weight. On the
> contrary, the adults have a very restful time in Brazil and return home fatter
> and healthier than at any other time of year.
>
> The penguins that the article refers to are eight month old juvenile penguins
> that were born last year. These penguins are not underweight because of a lack
> of food in the area. These young juveniles are under-weight because they still
> lack the strength and speed of the adults, and are not fast enough to catch fish
> easily. The first year is always tough for these juveniles. Most survive their
> first year and go on to become strong and healthy, but sadly some do not make
> it and get washed up ashore.
>
> In Brazil there are beach patrols that look for sick and under-weight penguins.
> They help these penguins by giving them food and letting them rest for a couple
> of weeks in their penguin hospital, before releasing them back into the sea.
> I attach a photo of one of these people helping a juvenile penguin. The lady
> in the photo is part of the Santos Basin Beach Monitoring Project.
>
> The penguin in the photo is an 8 month old Magellanic penguin, and is healthy
> except for being underweight. After a week or two in hospital with plenty of
> fish, he will be released back to sea. The photo is part of the Rio Times article
> which also promotes the valuable work being done by the Santos Basin Project.
>
> The penguins will remain in Brazil for a few more weeks, and then Promises will
> start heading back home. Back here in the empty colony the days are starting
> to get longer again, so spring is on the way. Before long it will be time for
> Promises to begin another season of chick-rearing.
>
> I will write to you again in a few weeks, by which time Promises will be heading
> back home.
>
> Kind regards, Mike
>
>
