Our black and white friends…

A penguin nesting under a bush…

The penguins in Simon’s Town are an ‘institution’ older than I am. I remember, as a child of no more than ten or so, going to visit them. Back then, one could simply walk on the beach amongst them. Today, fortunately, they are properly protected. Which is a good thing considering how rare they are.

A board in the car park gives you all the information required.

In May 2005, the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) classified African penguins as Endangered. In September 2010, it was listed as endangered under the US Endangered Species Act, and as of 2024, the African penguin is listed as critically endangered on the IUCN Red List, with the remaining mature individuals numbering around 19,800 birds in a declining population.

Boulders Penguin Colony in Simon’s Town is home to a unique and endangered land-based colony of African Penguins. In 1956 when the first full census was conducted on the African penguin, there were approximately 150 000 breeding pairs counted. In 2009 there were only 26 000 breeding pairs left in the world. There has been a 93% population decline over some 70 years. According to the IUCN’s latest assessment, from July 2024, only about 1,200 penguin pairs are estimated to survive in Namibia, and 8,750 pairs in South Africa. When one considers the magnitude of this world we live in, it’s not very many…

Doomed hat (which you cannot retrieve). Shortly after this image, there was another. Be sure to wear a tight cap on windy days…

The earliest mention of penguins on land in the vicinity of Simon’s Town comes from Governor Simon van der Stel on 19 November 1687, who mentions a rock where “there were many penguins and gulls which were so tame they could be caught by hand” (McKenzie 1998). From the description of the rock, it is thought that van der Stel was referring to a rock known as “Noah’s Ark”, a well-known landmark in Simon’s Bay, which is named from its peculiar shape.

Noah’s Ark -a rock in Simon’s Bay in False Bay.

Dyer Island was once the most important breeding ground in the world for the African penguin. Penguins traditionally made their burrows / nests in “guano”, which is a mix of eggshell, feathers, bird excrement and decaying material. This provided well protected, temperature-controlled nesting grounds. All was well until the 1800s when England and America needed fertiliser for their exhausted soils. So, the guano was extensively mined in the 19th and early 20th centuries, where it was scraped from the penguin breeding grounds. With the guano gone, the penguins can’t burrow, so they have to nest on open ground. These nests are exposed to the harsh African heat, flooding and their chicks and eggs are vulnerable to predators like kelp gulls. As recently as the 1970s, there were still 25 000 breeding pairs of penguins on Dyer Island. Today that number stands at just over 1 200 pairs. The reasons for the dramatic population drop are many, but a key problem remains the historic removal of guano, which started in the 1840s and only stopped in the mid-1900s. 

Don’t stick your finger through the fence 😉.

The tanker Esso Wheeling sank in 1948, and the oil spill killed thousands of penguins from Dyer Island. In 1971, the oil tanker SS Wafra grounded on a reef off Cape Agulhas after her engine floundered due to a leak in her cooling system. A 32 km by 4.8 km oil spill resulted, which once again affected the penguin colony adversely. Along with increased fishing of their favoured prey, it’s no wonder the population declined rapidly.

Some penguins from Dyer Island moved to False Bay in 1982 – where two breeding pairs started a colony. At the time, False Bay was closed to commercial fishing. This was great news for the penguins as there was an abundance of food! Many have settled now on Boulders Bay beach where they typically nest in burrows dug into the sandy dunes.

Penguin in its nest that it dug for itself on the beach…

Artificial nests can increase breeding rates of endangered African penguins, a Nelson Mandela University-led study has found. And so, in the absence of guano, the Dyer Island Conservation Trust has come up with a burrow-substitute. It’s a fibrecrete artificial penguin nest. The nests are designed to improve breeding success by sheltering the young from predators. They also reduce heat stress. You can also see these at Boulders Beach in Simon’s Town.

The fibrecrete nests provided for the penguins.

The five life stages of an African penguin are an egg, hatchling, chick, juvenile and adult. Two whitish eggs (about three to four times larger than a hen’s egg) are laid two days apart, but the female starts incubating as soon as the first egg is laid. Incubation lasts 38-42 days. As a result, they also hatch two days apart. When hatching, they are blind, wobbly and covered in a fine down. They are completely reliant on their parents who take turns protecting the young. They can only walk at around three weeks. They are fed by their parents for up to three months, at which point they moult their down feathers and are then able to swim and forage – with the parent still providing food.

The walkway at Boulders is well maintained and so provides easy access for the disabled.

Moulting occurs annually in all penguins. Their new feathers are not waterproof at the time of the moult, and so they are unable to forage. They thus make sure that they fatten before this takes place to last them through this lean time. The moulting period can take up to 20 days.

An African penguin in the middle of its moult.

When you stand and look at these little birds, it is hard to comprehend that they are almost extinct – like so many of our other iconic species. We, as a human race, are slowly driving these little fellows to the brink. That is why, I believe, it is always worth doing what little you can, whenever you can, for animals in this position – we may just be able to save them from extinction…

Jacqui Ikin & The Cross Country Team

INFO BLOCK:

Some interesting reads:
https://sanccob.co.za/
https://sanccob.co.za/news/african-penguin-newly-classified-as-critically-endangered-as-breeding-pairs-fall-below-10000/
https://only.one/act/save-african-penguins