00:19I'm at the San Diego Zoo's Children's Zoo and I'm about to go meet with the keeper of these guys,
00:23our newest ambassadors here at the zoo. Let's go check it out.
00:31So Jamie, I know we haven't had penguins here at the San Diego Zoo in over 35 years. How much
00:35fun is
00:36it to work with these adorable African penguins? It's a lot of fun to care for these two penguins.
00:40Every morning we come in and we start off with preparing their fish, their diet for the day,
00:45separating it and weighing it out. What sort of fish do we feed them here? They get night smelt,
00:49capelin smelt and sardines. We know exactly how much fish of each kind we give them and they
00:55actually have a favorite kind of fish. There's one penguin in particular that prefers a certain
01:00fish and doesn't care for another fish. So we always give them a little bit of extra,
01:03a preferable one, a little bit less of one he doesn't care for to make sure he gets all the
01:07nutrition that he needs. And they get a weekly wait every week and we know if we need to increase
01:12their fish or decrease their fish because their diets and appetite does change throughout the year.
01:20These two penguins are going to be ambassadors for the San Diego Zoo and well I know for some
01:23of our ambassador animals it's kind of important to be a social animal. They're very social animals
01:27and so they live in a group and they tend to stay with each other and they greet us right
01:31when they
01:32come to the door and that's why when there is a keeper in there they spend most of their time
01:35with
01:35the keeper as well. It's just another another body in there for them. One brother tends to be more
01:45outgoing than the other and pushes his brother away. He tends to think that his brother always
01:50gets the best fish therefore he wants to steal his brother's fish instead of eat his own,
01:53but it does go back and forth. They do a lot of swimming in their exhibit. There's one brother
01:58that will do more swimming than the other and that same brother will actually do a lot more climbing
02:03than the other brother which is really interesting.
02:09I know there's a special name for when a penguin sort of jumps out of the water like a dolphin.
02:14What's that called? It's called porpoising they come out of the water straight out of the water.
02:18One isn't as good at it as the other but he always tries his best and usually fails but he
02:22tries and
02:23tries again. So when working with a species where you have more than one individual how do you tell
02:28them apart? Well if you look closely you can see the body pattern on them is unique to each individual
02:33kind of like your fingerprint. So when keepers need to work with more than one animal in a group like
02:38this we start to learn not only their individual personalities but their body patterns too. The African
02:43penguin lives in Africa and spends a lot of time on the beach so that means they have to deal
02:47with
02:47warmer temperatures. So when it gets too hot what do they do? Well they have little bear patches above
02:52their eyes that actually radiate heat helps kind of regulate their body temperature and if they get
02:57too warm they'll even start panting a little bit to bring that heat out of the body and into the
03:01atmosphere. So check this out penguins can swim 15 miles an hour. It doesn't seem that fast to
03:07think about that one of the fastest olympians only swam about five and a half miles an hour in a
03:11sprint.
03:11And get this penguins can hold their breath for up to two and a half minutes. So if you do
03:15the
03:15math 15 miles an hour well they'll travel almost a half a mile in one breath. That's pretty cool.
03:23Have you ever heard the term when penguins fly? Well it's true they don't actually fly in the air
03:28but their body just like all other birds has a tail and wings that they use a lot of the
03:33same muscles
03:33and they'll sort of maneuvering through the water as a bird does when it flies.
03:38So it's not completely untrue to say when penguins fly.
03:43What is preening? Well penguins have a waterproof coat of feathers that they maintain by preening
03:48which basically is straightening and cleaning with their beak. They put their beak in and run it
03:51through keeps them very clean but also keeps the water off their body.
03:59I had so much fun talking to Keeper Jamie about the African penguins and I hope you enjoyed it too.
04:04I can't wait to see what their next adventure is going to be right here at the San Diego Zoo.
04:07If you go to school, do I take the water you need to be right here at the San Diego
04:12Zoo.
04:12The National bacon ngoниц� 53 degrees
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