After two days of mostly overcast skies and moderate to heavy snow, it was a pleasure waking up this morning to find a clear day with sunny skies. Outside our cabin, in the water, we could see hundreds of King penguins swimming in the ocean, diving down for food, and making the water’s surface come alive.

After breakfast we were taken ashore at Salisbury Plain (see GPS tracking data in the previous post), where we encountered far more King penguins than we could count. In fact, the King penguin colony there was so large I felt the need to shoot a panoramic sequence. If you want to get a good idea of the sheer mass of penguin life, click on the image below to see a 12,112 pixel wide image of the penguin colony.

Panorama of King Penguin colony at Salisbury Plain, South Georgia, with expedition members

King penguins are the second largest type of penguin in the world after Emperor penguins, and unlike the other penguins we have seen so far, they breed year round. Also, they don’t feed on krill – instead they eat lantern fish and squid. Thus, their guano piles are brown and muddy looking instead of pink like that of the krill eating penguins like the Adelie, Gentoo, and Chinstrap penguins.

The Salisbury Plain area is a beautiful area - with snow covered mountains and verdant plains - and King penguins

A King penguin getting comfortable atop a tussock grass mound

Because the King penguins breed year round, we saw some penguins with eggs, others with tiny chicks, big fluffy penguin chicks who no longer needed immediate protection, and even ones on the edge of adulthood.

This penguin is checking on its egg, which it keeps in a brood pouch above its feet

This young King penguin gives the phrase 'fat chick\

A King penguin chick almost done losing its down en route to becoming an adult

Also, as another component of a non-seasonally driven breeding season we saw ample evidence of courtship behaviors.

A part of the King penguin courting rituals - also note the tongue visible on the left penguins

A tender moment between a nesting pair of King penguins

Mating between King penguins is quick, and if it works results in a single fertilized egg

All in all, the two hours we spent at Salisbury Plain did not seem to be nearly enough, but we’re so glad we had the opportunity to see these beautiful creatures in their native habitat.

Coming out of the ocean after feeding, this King penguin still has water droplets on its feathers

Larger versions of all of the above images can be found on my Flickr pages.

Tags: Antarctica, colony, King penguins, Salisbury Plain, South Georgia

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010 at 9:54 pm and is filed under Animals, Birds, Nature. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.