King penguins number more than 2 million world-wide with 450,000 in South Georgia alone. They are especially docile, curious and friendly. They are perhaps the most splashy in color with their bright orange feathers. When molting, they have a very scruffy appearance as they grow their new (non-waterproofed) feathers relying entirely on their fat reserves to carry them through the three-week molting process.
PENGUINS
Five of the eleven known species of penguin breed in the Falklands:
King penguins stand 30 inches tall and are the largest and most brightly colored of the species. Their breeding or incubation cycle can last up to 14 months.
Gentoo penguins have an elegant white strap that runs across their heads from one eye to the other and are widely dispersed around the islands.
Rockhopper penguins are the smallest of the breeding penguins, 13 inches tall and nest on rocky coastlines, making astonishing climbs (as we observed) at West Pointy Island.
Macaroni penguins look quite similar to the Rockhoppers, but are larger and have more flamboyant yellow crests.
Magellanic penguins live in colonies that nest in burrows dug into the peaty soil and which I photographed marching into the water at Bluff Cove Farm, Falkland Islands.
The Gentoo Penguins are the most numerous of all penguin species in Antarctica and can reach a height of 36 inches and weighing up to 19 pounds - making them the largest penguins outside of the two giant species, the Emperor Penguin and the King Penguin. They are the fastest swimmers reaching speeds of up to 36 km/hr. There are over 300,000 breeding pairs in Antarctica. Nests are usually made fro a roughly circular pile of stones and can be quite large, 20 cm high and 25 cm in diameter. Two eggs are laid, both weighting around 500 grams each. The parents share incubation, changing duty daily. They eggs hatch after 35 days with the chicks remaining in the nests or about 30 days. The chicks molt into sub-adult plumage and go out to sea at about 80-100 days. Gentoos live mainly on crustaceans such as krill, on fish and squid. Their call is reminiscent of the sound of a donkey's he-haw.'
The Adelie Penguins number 2.6 million pairs, world-wide with bright blue eyes. They are distinctively simply black and white and breeds further south than any other species.
Chinstrap penguins have a fine line of black feathers under their white chin.
SOUTH GEORGIA ISLAND, ANTARCTICA
"His Antarctic Highness, Jackson, The King Penguin"
From: "Happily Lost in Time and Place"
(Available on www.Amazon.com)
by Erika Atkinson
erikainparis@sbcglobal.net
January 2010
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Filled with overwhelming excitement, I stepped out of the zodiac directly into what I would consider, for me, to be one of the most spectacular wildlife visuals in the animal world, a vision not only involving but truly overtaxing all the senses. Wherever I looked, all I could see was penguins, an enormous and endless forest of penguins, rising and stretching and swirling and weaving its way for several kilometers up the mountainside, all the way to the retreating glacier at the horizon. The braying sound was deafening and the viscous smell of the guano simply unbelievable. A completely unforgettable and undeniably potent first major penguin impression. Standing on the periphery, I was frozen in a solitary gaze at this overpowering scene and shaking my head in disbelief, speechless, probably for the only time ever in my life.
Breathless with anticipation, on my way into this forest of penguins, I followed close behind Maggie, one of the guides, plodding carefully across small, dangerously sharp rocks, into the midst of female Fur seal multitudes nursing their pups, and several hundred aggressive male Fur seals hissing at us without hesitation from their harems as we passed by.
Once beyond the furry mounds of seals, Maggie led me to a spot somewhere in the midst of all this profusion and I stopped, absolutely immobilized, thunderstruck, realizing I was suddenly surrounded by endless hectares of King penguins, feeling completely paralyzed inside a cacophony of symphonic sound that would have challenged any Twentieth Century twelve-tone composer. Someone next to me said: "And can you imagine; in the midst of all this discordance, penguin chicks are able to identify their very own parents' call in less than a few seconds!"
Daring to wander farther in and among them, I became almost tone deaf by their inharmonic trumpet calls. Non-stop and contagious, it was their way of ultimately arousing thousands to join in until their ecstatic and pompous display had spread throughout the entire colony. I pretended it was my welcome anthem! The whole situation was more than my overwhelmed mind could absorb or process in the short amount of time the group was allowed to remain here.
The visual beauty of the Kings, in stunning tailer-made coats of orange, yellow, black, and white, provided a veritable feast for the eye; three feet of noble distinction and grandeur standing out so exquisitely above the brownish carpet of thousands of chicks in their molting coats, interspersed and interwoven all throughout.
Numbed by their superior force and powerful nature, and literally being pulled inside their songs and throngs, the urge to just sit there a spell came easily. Time to be here, I thought, to observe their behavior, their actions and reactions, so humanlike, so fearless, and so friendly; to laugh at their humor and their physical antics, and to watch them feed their chicks and attend to them, and ultimately to watch them waddle through endless stagnant pools of mud and excrement as they headed in a single file line for a wash in the seaside surf below.
Once I had come to a good observation point, I also hoped for a non-guano-covered rock to sit on, but to no avail. In this universe, every square centimeter has penguin poop on it. Grabbing a few biodegradable tissues out of my pocket, I wiped what I could off the very top of one rock, and finally just sat down in my easy-to-clean waterproof pants, and focused.
My eyes were about to lock on one penguin, a tall guy, and very confident, when a gentle tap on my shoulder from my friend Tom brought the announcement: "That's Jackson!" Fair enough, I smiled, a good and full name for a handsome and strong penguin.
Completely upright before me, Jackson looked extremely dignified in his formal black and white coat, perfectly adorned by the orange patches extending downward on either side of his head and meeting beneath his chin like a starched collar, his outfit completed by his yellow bow tie mounted at the top of his silvery-white breast plumage.
Jackson liked me instantly. Docile, tractable, curious, and friendly, he stood tall on his patch, his heels in balance, and his back proudly arched. He did seem frozen to the ground, moving his regal head from side to side like a pivot upon his fixed body.
For a quiet moment, I wondered: am I mirroring him, or is he mimicking me?
Attempting several gentle movements and whispered sounds, I tried to take advantage of his laser-focused attention, in hopes of getting a specific reaction. He stared with keen interest, fixing his gaze on me, dead on, face to face, eyes unblinking. Finally, I opened my mouth to speak directly but softly to him. " Hey, Jackson," I said in a near whisper, and he responded, with a slight movement of his head.
Instantly excited by his reaction, I quietly said, "Oh, you are such a beauty", and this time he slowly blinked, closing and opening his eyes just once. How great! A phenomenal and astounding miracle moment.
I enjoyed this attention for a number of seconds, and then decided to test his focus on me. I leaned to my left and said, "Jackson, you are so handsome!" At the sound, his head turned right, and he blinked his eyes once more. I did the same thing the other direction -- leaning my head to the right, saying "Jackson, you are very intelligent!" and he turned his head left, and acknowledged my compliment with another slow blink of his eye. I - was - elated, and felt I had opened a genuine and trusted communication channel with him.
Following that little experiment, Jackson and I both up-righted ourselves and stayed with the dead center focus, face to face. He kept his diligent gaze completely locked on me, without even moving a feather -- and without blinking! I was happy to remain in this stationary position for as long as he needed me there; in fact, I wanted to wait to see how long he would remain in the motionless silence immediately surrounding him and me. I recognized how comfortable I was, just the two of us staring at one another. Had he been human, I might have felt different.
Lost in time, we kept watching one another for quite a while, at least for as long as it took me to wonder what might be going through his mind in these circumstances when, suddenly, he broke my train of thought and stepped a little closer toward me, leaving a distance between us of only about two feet -- that's not very far when you consider the size of this creature.
I took off my gloves and let my ungloved bare left hand dangle from my knee to see if his curiosity would entice him to come up and either peck it, or smell it, or . . . kiss it! Within moments, he bent his elegant neck slightly downward directly toward my hand, and I felt his beak touch the top of it. Breathless, and filled with ethereal suspense, I waited for more contact. A tear fell and froze halfway down my cheek. He trusted me; in fact, he liked me, and I was unbelievably honored. I loved his concentrated gaze as I put the glove back on my very cold hand!
The silent dialogue went on a few minutes more, and then, perhaps feeling well enough acquainted, he released his feet from the heel position once more, moved a few more inches closer, put on his emergency brake, and fixed his gaze upon me with full-on all-out intensity. How excruciating it was, knowing I wasn't allowed to just reach my arm around him to hug him! His body language gave me every clue that he was waiting for it. I could even read it in the bubble above his head!
Yes, I was beginning to feel a strong urge to put words in that bubble for him. Completely arrested by a sweet confidence in one another, and through my poetic mind, my imagination could hear him say: " Sometimes the sun sets only once a year where I'm from. I miss it when it's gone, and it seems that the night is prolonged until the sun rises again, thank goodness. It is so cold that my hips forget their dance and my feet have to keep crossing to keep their warmth; my lips even chap, and food completely loses its appeal. Thank you for understanding. I have enjoyed your visit very much."
For a few moments longer, I remained sitting there, wondering so many more things: what his age might be, what his story had been so far, how many handsome King penguins he had been responsible for adding to the population. I wondered if he remembered being a chick, like we humans remember being kids. I wanted to answer all his silent questions to me. I wanted to toss a little ping pong ball with him. I wanted to scratch his belly, swim with him, be wise like he was, to go home and forever live in peace and harmony in my world in the manner in which I had observed him living in his -- the harshest environment known to mankind.
I had a hundred more things to ask Jackson, and to discuss with him, tell him. But it was time to leave. We were being summoned back to our zodiac by the sound of our leader's bullhorn.
Oh, how I hated to leave, but slowly I got up to begin the departure. Jackson stayed in position, and I wondered if by now he might have become seriously frozen to the spot. He watched me very closely; I walked a few steps away from him and turned around just in time to watch him pry himself loose and follow me. "Where are you going?" he seemed to say, looking straight up at me as if he wanted me to stay forever.
"Oh Jackson, how I wish I could pick you up and carry you all the way to San Francisco!"
The urge to stroke and pet him was becoming more difficult to resist with each passing half-minute. I wanted to kidnap him and bring him home, and sadly, he provided no reason on Earth as to why that would be impossible to do. "Take me; what's so difficult about that?" he seemed to question.
I moved forward a few more steps, and still he followed, though leaving more and more distance between us. Ten more short steps away from him, and Jackson, in his perplexed stance, was still there watching me. I waved, and I could have sworn his flipper moved in response. I will say it did, because I know he wanted to!
Turning around one last time, I noticed, a few penguin steps away from Jackson, a chick, perhaps his own, edging toward him, still wearing its youthful plumage, which I called its brown Russian fur coat. Made me want to walk back over and fluff it nicely for him! And then, within moments, the chick's mother entered the fold. She must have just eaten a fish on her daily excursion into the sea, digested it slightly, and was now regurgitating the food into her chick's mouth. Standing by proudly, I could hear Jackson say, ever so acceptingly, if not submissively: "Living's not always easy, but you just have to make the best of it!"
Finally walking away from this unbelievable colony of King penguins, with a certain sadness and definite heaviness in my heart, I understood why the benevolent penguin is the one animal people love coming to Antarctica for.
And I kept hoping that perhaps someone, from somewhere on this planet, might return here again one day and have another visit with my friend Jackson. Possessive of considerable wisdom along with a great sense of humor, he would have exhorted the onlooker: "Please, when you see Erika from San Francisco, give her my love, and tell her I think she lost her heart in Antarctica!"
"The Penguin Lessons"
PG-13 2024 1-hour, 46-minutes
Official Trailer
https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q="The+Penguin+Lessons"&mid=FEB73F7955C6A36F57DCFEB73F7955C6A36F57DC&FORM=VIRE
. . . . . . . . And Another Trailer:
https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q="The+Penguin+Lessons"&mid=59C9AE4E6E527EAF77C359C9AE4E6E527EAF77C3&FORM=VIRE
. . . . . . . . So sorry, there aren't any free streaming options for "The Penguin Lessons" at this time
This touching conedy-drama was inspired by the true story of an Englishman who went to work in a school in Argentina in 1976. Expecting an easy ride, Tom discovers a divided nation and a class of untouchable students.
This remarkable, bittersweet, well-crafted film about a Magellanic penguin ("Juan Salvador"), is based on a true story.
The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 6, 2024. The script was adapted by Jeff Pope from Tom Michell's memoir of the same name, published in 2015.
Tom Michell's 2015 memoir chronicles his experience as a British teacher who travelled to South America to teach at a boys' boarding school in Argentina in the 1970s. On a trip to Uruguay, he visited a beach in the Uruguayan resort of Punta del Este where he stumbled on many dead penguins soaked with oil. He noticed one penguin still alive, and so he decided to rescue it, bringing it to his hotel to clean and feed it. After that, the penguin would not leave him and kept following him; eventually he took it back to the school, where it became a popular pet.
The Plot: Disillusioned itinerant educator Tom Michell arrives at St. George's College, an exclusive boys school in Argentina, to teach English and coach rugby. He befriends his housekeeper Maria, her granddaughter Sofia, a political activist protesting the escalating 1976 Argentine coup d'etat, and St. George's science teacher Tapio. Despite Headmaster Buckle's full confidence in Michell's background, the latter struggles to keep his class attentive and well-behaved.
When a bombing in the city calls for students to be sent home for a week, Michell and Tapio take a trip to Uruguay. Michell meets a woman named Carina at a dance club, and they find an oil slick on the beach that has killed several Magellanic penguins, except for one. They take the surviving penguin to his hotel room to clean it in the bathtub.
Michell's attempts to release the penguin to the ocean result in it returning to him. Every time he tries to leave it behind, other people insist he accept responsibility, even under threat of arrest. So, Michell reluctantly smuggles it back to St. George's, and contacts a zoo. Upon observing the zoo's horrid conditions, he resolves to adopt the penguin, naming it Juan Salvador.
Maria and Sofia are charmed by the penguin, leading Michell to introduce Juan Salvador to his class, which succeeds in making them pay attention and excel in their studies. Michell bonds more with his students, permitting them to feed Juan Salvador fish while urging them to keep it secret from Buckle. Tapio also meets the penguin and has a personal conversation with it.
In the city, Michell witnesses Sofia being kidnapped by Argentine authorities for her activism. Visiting a grieving Maria at her home, Michell learns she will protest for Sofia's release and, touched by her strong family bond, he shares that he lost his teenage daughter to a car accident, which then caused a rift in his marriage. He confesses to Maria that he saw Sofia being taken away yet did nothing.
Buckle learns of Juan Salvador and, enforcing strict policies, orders Michell to leave St. George's. Michell confronts the militant that ordered Sofia's kidnapping and presses him to release her. He is promptly arrested and beaten, later bailed out by Tapio. Following the incident, Buckle reconsiders firing Michell, admitting that Juan Salvador's presence has positively affected the staff and student body, even having a personal talk with it himself. Juan Salvador is granted a swim in the school's pool.
Shortly after, Juan Salvador suddenly dies. Devastated, Michell gives it a burial on St. George's campus under a tree near the rugby field. As he presents his eulogy to the staff and students, a beaten and shaken Sofia returns. Michell looks on as Maria and her granddaughter reunite.