Sphenisciformes

A familiar family of flightless birds that are adapted for a marine lifestyle. All breed on land or ice and winter at sea. The family has also evolved to live in a wide variety of habitats with a wide range of temperatures, from 15-28°C in the case of warm-water species such as Galapagos Penguin (Spheniscus mendiculus), which breeds on the equator, to as low as -60°C for Emperor Penguin (Aptemodytes forsteri).

Additional information

Mostly diurnal, but one species is active at night. Penguins are expert swimmers. They move like porpoises, bouncing through the waves, using their wings as flippers for rapid underwater propulsion and their tail and feet as a rudder for direction. However, penguins are less adept on land. When walking, they shuffle on flattened legs or make short, rather ungainly hops, using their wings to balance. Species that breed on ice floes also move by lying down and 'tobogganing', using their legs and long claws for propulsion.

Penguins can regulate their body temperatures as they move between feeding in icy seas and coming ashore, where they may be exposed to hot sunshine; unable to sweat, they pant with their bill open, releasing heat from the fleshy gape.

With the exception of Yellow-eyed Penguin (Megadyptes antipodes), which nests in isolated pairs or scattered groups, all species breed colonially, sometimes in concentrations of several hundred thousand pairs. All are monogamous, and pairs of some species bond for more than a single breeding season. The largest penguins make no nest, but hold a single egg, and later the chick, on the feet and in a fold of skin above the vent. Chicks are fed on regurgitated food. From the time they acquire their first covering of down feathers, they live in creches; however, the parents feed the young for a further two months.

Taxonomy

Number of genera: 6

Number of species: 17

A list of all species can be found here.