The happiest days are when babies come. At least that's what Melanie Wilkes said in the screen classic, Gone With the Wind. It turns out it's true for animals as well, at least at the Chester Zoo near Liverpool England. Recently 8 Humboldt penguin chicks were hatched at the zoo and seem to be thriving in their new environment. The Humboldt penguin is a species from South America, named for the cold winds that blow on the coast of Peru and Chile. They are one of the most at risk species of penguins according to the International Union for the Conservation of Animals which has classified them as "Vulnerable."
The chicks were named for islands in Southeast Asia that will soon be highlighted in a new exhibit at the zoo. The first chick to hatch was Panay and the rest of chicks soon followed and were given the names Papua, Bali, Sumatra, Sulawesi, Sumba, Java, and Tuma in order of the islands zoo visitors will see when the zoo's island development opens in July.
In an interview with Mike Price of the Liverpool Echo, zoo penguin manager Andy Woolham said, "Naming the penguins is a bit of fun for the team, it allows us to track the age of the birds easily because doing it by their spot pattern can be challenging."
(Source: Liverpool Echo, Zooborns.com, Chester Zoo.org)
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