March and April of 2024 saw consistently rough sea conditions, stirring up the sediment from the seafloor, and making the ocean water murky. Unfortunately, this occurred just a few months before the penguins potentially could have begun breeding. Little penguins are visual hunters, so with murky coastal waters, the penguins likely work much harder to find their fish. This extra effort required to obtain food, resulted in a drop in the number of penguins arriving ashore each evening, as they had to remain at sea for multiple days. Therefore, at the start of the season we were a little apprehensive about how it was going to go, as these conditions can affect adult survival.
However, looking back, we can say that it was a successful season. It was a slow start, with our first eggs laid on the 20th June, however the majority of the penguins laid eggs in September, having taken a while to get into good body condition, following the poor sea conditions earlier in the season. By October, we were inundated with chicks, all of which were putting on weight and growing nicely. In fact, our heaviest chick for the season weighed in at a whopping 1.54 kgs at only six weeks old! We had a busy December, with 368 chicks across two colonies reaching six weeks old and needing to be microchipped in only a few short weeks. Luckily for us, we had some passionate penguin workers from around the country come and ‘chip-in’. It’s a win-win situation as they learn how to microchip little penguins, as well as giving us a helping hand.
Due to the slightly later start to the breeding season, we didn’t have as many second clutches (known as double brooding) as in previous seasons. However, we did have 32 enthusiastic pairs double brood, with a total of 59 second clutch eggs, 29 of which hatched. Of those 29 chicks, all grew to good healthy weights and fledged!
In total, we had 531 eggs laid, 417 chicks hatch, and 395 chicks fledge. The number of breeding pairs did drop by 55 from the previous season to 224 pairs following the tough start to 2024. This meant the total number of eggs laid, as well as chicks that hatched and fledged, was lower compared to the previous season. However, of the eggs that were laid, a higher number resulted in fledged chick, and they fledged at great weights as well, setting them up nicely for their own lives out at sea. Sometimes it really is about quality over quantity!
Once the chicks fledge, their parents undertake their annual moult, meaning they grow an entire new set of feathers. They have to be in good condition for this, as the process can take 2-3 weeks and requires them to stay on land for the duration. Check out our previous blog post to learn about the moult.