Recent Stories with tag penguins

Finally! The five Humboldt penguins born in April have joined the colony and are now on view in the Woodland Park Zoo's penguin exhibit.  The chicks have lost their fuzzy baby down, in favor of the sleek look, which is much more swim-friendly (see video above).  But you can still tell the babies from the adults by their light gray feathers. 

For the past few weeks, the chicks have prepared for their public debut with a lot of one-on-one time with the zookeepers to get used to interacting with zoo staff and to learn how to enter and exit the exhibit.  They've also been learning how to swim in a shallow pool. Of course, Flip camera footage ensues.

And because we just celebrated Independence Day, the zoo is offering everyone the chance to exercise their inalienable rights to name zoo babies:...

(more)

Photo credit: Ryan Hawk/Woodland Park Zoo

Those penguin chicks better watch out, because the kids are coming up from behind. Over the weekend, a baby pudu was born at the Woodland Park Zoo. I've never even heard of a pudu, but I'm sure it's come up in a crossword puzzle a time or two, as it's the smallest deer species in the world.

The pudu is native to South America, and grows to be 14-18 inches high (at the shoulder), weighing anywhere from 14-30 pounds. The tiny deer inhabits temperate rainforests, living in "dense underbrush and bamboo thickets" to avoid predators, like owls, pumas, foxes, and feral dogs. Of course, the biggest threat to the endangered pudu is man, with the pudu's natural habitat disappearing to development, agriculture, logging, and other human activities.

And while the baby penguins are still under wraps, the parents and baby pudu are on view in an exhibit adjacent to the flamingos. The new baby is the sixth offspring of a twelve-year-old mother and ten-year-old father pudu. (Check out this video for footage of a day-old pudu born at the zoo two years ago.) No word yet on the fawn's sex or potential name, but tomorrow marks a neonatal exam and weigh-in for the newborn, which means more pudu photos and video to come.

The meerkats are back! These eight have arrived from Point Defiance Zoo, four male, four female, and they definitely packed their charisma and curiosity with them. Tomorrow, May 1, Woodland Park Zoo is celebrating their arrival--and the grand opening of a new West Entrance--with six hours of festivities, including music by CocoLoco, giveaways, photo opportunities with a costumed meerkat mascot, meerkat mask-making, and meerkat keeper talks at 11:00 a.m., 1:00 p.m., and 2:30 p.m. Things kick off at 9:30 a.m. and go until 3:30 p.m. 

The 9 a.m. ribbon-cutting ceremony for the West Entrance brings a host of dignitaries: U.S. Representative Jim McDermott (D-Seattle), Seattle Mayor Michael McGinn, Seattle City Council member Sally Bagshaw, Bank of America Washington Market President Peter Joers, Woodland Park Zoo President and CEO Dr. Deborah Jensen, and Woodland Park Zoo Board of Directors Chair and Co-chair of the Penguin/West Entrance Initiative, Cam Ragen. 

The West Entrance is really a new, 58,000-square-foot complex, with a commons area for head-counting and ticket booths, family restrooms, member and guest services, a second ZooStore location, and--later this summer--a Caffé Vita coffee cart.

That's the title of the first video released by the Woodland Park Zoo of their newborn Humboldt penguin, so why edit it?  The super-cute clip above is actually of the older of the two babies at the zoo, as this chick's sibling hatched just as expected on Easter. 

Both are being taken care of by first-time parents Dora and PJ, but are getting regular checkups by the zoo's staff.  That healthy little guy is just peeping away.  But he (or she--you can't tell with penguins at first) won't be little for much longer; the baby doubled its weight in only 6 days!  The older chick is now 5 ounces, while the brand-new baby is still half that size.

The penguin chicks won't be introduced to the public until sometime this summer, so for now we'll just have to settle for the videos and photos posted from time to time on the zoo's blog and YouTube channel.

Photo credit: Ryan Hawk/Woodland Park Zoo

Move over snow leopard cubs, the Woodland Park Zoo has a new baby on the block. A Humboldt penguin chick hatched yesterday. The wee baby penguin (only 2.1 ounces!) is the first offspring for mother Dora and father PJ, both three years old. And there's more where that came from: there's another five eggs--across three penguin pair nests in the zoo's Humboldt colony--at least three of which are believed to be fertile. Dora and PJ have another egg showing "pipping activity," and it's expected to hatch on Easter Sunday. Just like Jesus!

This'll be the first set of penguin babies hatched since the zoo got their Humboldt penguins last year and started on their species survival plan to breed this endangered bird. The chicks and parents will need some time to bond in private, so it won't be until early summer that you'll be able to see these little guys in the cute feathery flesh. By that point, the chicks will have molted from the grayish brown, downy feathers they're born with to completely gray feathers. It won't be till next year that they'll take on their adult look.

Annex Theatre has put together a holiday-skewering, comedy triple header (called Annex Triple Header) that is emphatically not for everyone. From now until December 19, Friday and Saturday nights at the Annex bring you a blasphemous puppet show, a comedy competition, and a nunsploitation episode (tickets: $10-$12 each, or $25 for a triple header pass good for multiple nights).

There's a distinct Gong Show vibe to the whole evening, except without the gong. If you know and love the Annex, you will laugh heartily and get raging drunk afterward in their bar as a means of support. If you haven't been, this is an evening of fringe (in so many senses of the word) comedy, so be prepared. In many--if not most--ways it is highly inappropriate for children and pedophiles, because you wouldn't want both in the same room.

[Pause for laughter]

[Wait for it...wait for it]

It Came From Under the Tree begins with three drunken, slutty, under-rehearsed elves with surprisingly good singing voices (Operadisiac, says the program, solving that mystery). They provide burlesque interludes between low-budget puppetry of the Nativity, Black Peter, a Michael Jackson/Grinch mashup, drunken uncles, and of course A Christmas Carol.

Highlights include a casting coup for Herod's baby executioner, a ghost with a foot-odor fetish, and improvisational work with a tree ornament. Inexplicably, Harry S Truman appeared as the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. Brian Kooser's puppets are magic, even if the jokes are hit-and-miss....

(more)