What penguins are there

These birds are slightly larger than the average penguin, but far smaller than emperors. Still, they're the third-largest penguin species and usually weigh around 12 pounds.

King penguins look similarly to emperor penguins, with colorful plumage accentuating their black-and-white pattern. It's worth noting, however, that the black of the king penguin is not as dark as other penguin species, and could possibly be described as dark gray. The second-largest species of penguin is the king penguin.

King penguins are found much further north than emperor penguins, and they only spend part of the year on Antarctica itself. They breed in large colonies, but may leave the chicks unattended during winter. It is during this time that many King penguins can be found traveling to the northern part of the Antarctic Peninsula. If emperor and king penguins are classy, macaroni penguins are eccentric. Small and stout, their most recognizable feature is their bright, spiky, orange eyebrows.

These eyebrow-like markings called crests are actually fairly common in the penguin world, but they're usually a light yellow color. There are plenty of macaroni penguins around - in fact, there is reason to believe they are the most abundant penguin species. The don't live on Antarctica all year around, but when they travel to their furthest south points, they may reach some of the islands surrounding the continent.

The rockhoppers are one of the more ornate penguins, decorated with yellow eyebrow used to attract a mate. Normally, these ice-loving birds stand 16 to 18 inches tall and are found swimming between sub Antarctic islands. Watch them shake their heads extremely fast so their yellow brow looks like a halo. These penguins get their names from their distinct method of moving around.

As the name suggests, they like to hop from stone to stone in the rockier parts of the northern Antarctic islands. Although they never travel far south enough to be found on Antarctica itself, travelers may still catch a glimpse of them on their way to the south pole. Emperor penguins are the largest, boldest and most well-dressed of all penguin species. More than 1, miles separate the archipelago from South America and Africa, its closest continental neighbors, making it the most remote island chain in the world.

Though the islands are small, they are important nesting sites for northern rockhopper penguins. Inaccessible Island alone, which is only five square miles in size, is home to a population of 27, penguins. These numbers mark a precipitous decline since the s, when some south Atlantic islands hosted populations of more than a million birds. The species is now endangered , and researchers believe the declining numbers are largely due to rising ocean temperatures and a reduction in prey.

Despite its reputation as a tropical destination, New Zealand is home to four species of penguins which thrive in the cold currents of the Southern Ocean—little, snares, yellow-eyed, and Fiordland crested penguins. The endangered yellow-eyed penguin is the largest of the penguins found in New Zealand, and also the rarest, with an estimated population of 4, South Africa has only recently become a habitat for penguins.

For most of its history, the African penguin has been confined to living on various islands along the coastline of southern Africa, from Angola to Mozambique. However, in , two colonies were established on mainland beaches near Cape Town. Researchers have determined that these mainland colonies can now thrive because increasing human populations have driven back predators that would otherwise decimate a penguin colony.

Across its entire range, however, the African penguin's population has declined rapidly since the s, and the species is now considered endangered. Both chains lie more than miles southeast of New Zealand. These uninhabited spits of land are steep, rocky, and the sole breeding grounds of erect-crested penguins.

These penguins are among the least-researched, and little is known about their migration patterns. They have been observed to arrive on the islands in September and remain there to breed and raise their young until February. Afterwards, they will return to the sea, and not be seen on land again until the following September. South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands is a steep, mountainous island chain in the south Atlantic Ocean with no permanent inhabitants.

In the early 20th century, there were outposts on the islands used by whalers, which have since disappeared. In modern times, they are best known as the breeding grounds for large colonies of penguins, including macaroni, king, and chinstrap penguins. One of six species of crested penguins, the macaroni penguin earned its name thanks to the extended, yellow feathers above its eyes that look reminiscent of macaroni noodles. They gather in large, dense breeding colonies in excess of , birds.

In total, there are more than one million breeding pairs of macaroni penguins on the islands. Actively scan device characteristics for identification. Use precise geolocation data. Not only do chinstrap penguins look like they are wearing little army helmets all the time, but they are the most common penguin on Antarctica - with almost 13 million individuals.

Magellanic penguins Spheniscus magellanicus look very similar to African penguins, but they have a dark black neck stripe which distinguishes them from their African cousins. They inhabit the southern coasts of South America, but do occasionally nest as far north as Brazil. Unlike their African counterparts, Magellanic penguins actively hunt jellyfish!

Southern rockhopper penguins Eudyptes chrysocome chrysocome call the Falkland Islands home. They look very similar to other rockhoppers, but do not have the usual patch of pale skin below their beaks, and a few black feathers in their crests.

They are cute, but their birdsong is very rough and they are probably the least musical penguin. Macaroni penguins Eudyptes chrysolophus are the most abundant species in the world, with almost 24 million penguins in colonies spanning South America, Australia, Antarctica and Marion Island - more than all other penguins combined.

They are vulnerable, as almost all colonies are under threat from human settlement, but huge conservation efforts are being made to protect these little ones in Chile and Argentina. Australian little penguins Eudyptula novaehollandiae , live on the southern Australian coast, Tasmania and a single small colony in New Zealand.

They were only recently determined to be a unique species by DNA testing. Australian little penguins "speak" with a higher pitched "accent" than their closely related New Zealand cousins. Emperor penguins Aptenodytes forsteri are the largest and tallest of all the penguins, and call the shores of Antarctica home. These penguins nest almost exclusively on Antarctic sea ice, making them the only bird species that never sets foot on land.

Snares crested penguins Eudyptes robustus are very unusual, nesting in open coastal forests on small islets around New Zealand's South Island. The main way these penguins communicate is by chest pumping to attract mates and bowing regularly to their partners and children.

They are a banded penguin, closely related to the African penguin, but far smaller. Their small size allows them to subsist entirely on small coastal minnows and shellfish, avoiding deep-water predators. Inhabiting Bounty and Antipodes Islands of New Zealand, erect-crested penguins Eudyptes sclateri are serious long-distance swimmers - hunting as far as South America and Antarctica to fatten up for their summer moults.

We think they have the coolest hairstyles of all penguins - and they spend large amounts of time grooming each other! Royal penguins Eudyptes schlegeli are unusual, living only on the sub-Antarctic island of Macquarie. They look like Macaroni penguins, but with white faces instead of a black ones - for this reason there is much disagreement about whether they are actually two distinct species. Together with the Macaroni penguin, these are the only two species whose crests meet in the middle.

Another close relative of African penguins, Humboldt penguins Spheniscus humboldti have a distinct black face with a white ring around it and pink exposed skin below its bill. A Humboldt penguin made world news when it escaped from Tokyo Sea Life Park by climbing a 4m high wall and a barbed wire fence.

It then survived in the waters of Japan for 82 days before being found. Eastern rockhopper penguins Eudyptes chrysocome filholi are very closely related to southern rockhoppers - in fact they can only be differentiated by their DNA and their unique birdsongs.

These cryptic penguins inhabit several sub-Antarctic islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. They are unusual and awesome , as they are the only penguin to live in rainforests! Allied king penguins Aptenodytes patagonicus halli inhabit the southern islands of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, such as Marion Island.

There are no easily identifiable differences between the two types of king penguins, but they are genetically distinct. Allied king penguins tend to be highly variable in size due to the different diets they are exposed to on the islands they inhabit. Gentoo penguins have generally been regarded as a single species, with a smaller subspecies that lives on Antarctica Pygoscelis papua ellsworthii and a larger one that inhabits Subantarctic islands Pygoscelis papua papua , such as South Africa's Marion Island.

A recent genetic study in Ecology and Evolution has revealed that not only are those two subspecies actually distinct species, but the Subantarctic variety is actually divided into three! These proposed 4 gentoo species divisions are not yet verified, but it seems certain that they will at least be regarded as new subspecies of Pygoscelis papua. Gentoo penguins Pygoscelis papua are larger than the other types of gentoos, even though those are the ones you most likely recognise from photos.

These gentoos inhabit the Falkland Islands, but are also considered inhabitants of other southern Indian and Atlantic Oceans islands, such as Marion Island, in definitions that do not include the two new species. They make their nests from mounds of grass collected near their beaches.

Ellsworth's gentoo penguins Pygoscelis papua ellsworthii , proposed Pygoscelis ellsworthii live exclusively on the coast of Antarctica.