Fiordland Penguin

Most people picture penguins waddling across ice or bare rock. The Fiordland Penguin, known to Maori as tawaki, breaks the mold entirely: it breeds in cool temperate rainforest, scrambling up mossy slopes and through tangled tree roots on some of the wettest, wildest coastline on Earth. A medium-sized crested penguin, it wears a broad sulphur-yellow eyebrow stripe that sweeps back from the bill and droops into a shaggy crest behind the eye, set off against a blue-black head and back and crisp white underparts.

It is also one of the world's rarest penguins. The entire breeding population is confined to the southwestern corner of New Zealand's South Island, Stewart Island, and nearby offshore islands, with the total population generally estimated at only a few thousand breeding pairs. Shy, largely nocturnal in its comings and goings ashore, and hidden in dense forest when nesting, the tawaki is one of the least-seen and most enigmatic penguins anywhere. Recent tracking work has revealed another surprise: after breeding, these penguins undertake enormous ocean journeys, traveling thousands of kilometers toward subantarctic waters before returning to molt.

Look for a stocky, medium-sized penguin with blue-black upperparts, white underparts, and a bold yellow stripe running from the base of the bill back over the eye, ending in a drooping, bushy crest. Two features help separate it from very similar crested penguins: most Fiordland Penguins show a few thin white streaks across the dark cheeks, and the bill lacks the bare strip of pink skin at its base that Snares Penguins show. In practice, range is your best clue, since this is the only crested penguin breeding on the New Zealand mainland.

Male vs. female

Males and females look essentially identical in plumage, both wearing the same yellow crest, dark head, and white underparts. The most reliable difference is the bill: males are slightly larger overall and have a noticeably deeper, heavier bill, a pattern typical of crested penguins. Side by side at the nest the difference can be surprisingly obvious, but a lone bird at sea or on a beach is usually best left unsexed. Behavior offers hints during breeding, since males typically take the first long incubation shift while females forage, and males do most of the chick-guarding in the weeks after hatching.

Juveniles

Juvenile Fiordland Penguins are duller versions of their parents. The yellow eyebrow stripe is present but thinner, paler, and shorter, without the full drooping crest of an adult, and the chin and throat are mottled whitish-gray rather than solidly dark. The bill is smaller and duller brown. Downy chicks in the nest are brownish-gray above and whitish below. Young birds at sea can be confused with juveniles of other crested penguins, which is genuinely difficult; location and the whitish throat are the most useful clues. Full adult plumage develops over the first couple of years.

No melodious song here: like all crested penguins, the Fiordland Penguin communicates in loud, harsh brays, trumpets, and rhythmic pulsing cries that carry through the forest at breeding sites. The main advertising display is dramatic to watch, with the bird throwing its head back, spreading its flippers, and delivering a loud, throbbing bray. Pairs greet each other with mutual trumpeting and head-swinging displays that help mates and chicks recognize each other by voice among the rocks and roots.

Softer contact grunts and hisses are given at the nest, and disturbed birds may growl or snap. Because colonies are loose and hidden in dense vegetation, calls are often the first and only sign that penguins are present. Away from the breeding grounds and at sea, the birds are typically silent.

The Fiordland Penguin breeds only in New Zealand, along a narrow strip of the wet southwestern coast. Core areas are the fiords and offshore islets of Fiordland on the South Island's west coast, the coast around and south of Bruce Bay and Jackson Bay in South Westland, and Stewart Island (Rakiura) with its outlying islands such as the Solander and Codfish groups. It favors rugged, high-rainfall coastline backed by dense temperate rainforest, nesting in sea caves, under boulders, and among the roots of coastal trees close to the shore.

Outside the breeding season the picture opens up dramatically. Adults leave the coast after breeding and again after their post-breeding molt, dispersing far across the southern oceans; satellite tracking has shown birds traveling thousands of kilometers toward subantarctic and Tasman waters. Vagrants and post-breeding wanderers turn up along the coasts of southern Australia, Tasmania, and even subantarctic islands, which is why beachcast or resting birds occasionally surprise people far from any colony.

The Fiordland Penguin is a pursuit diver, chasing prey underwater with powerful flipper strokes. Its diet is dominated by cephalopods (small squid and octopus), krill and other crustaceans, and small fish, with the balance shifting through the season and between years. Cephalopods and krill tend to feature strongly, while fish can become more important at times, particularly when adults are working hard to provision growing chicks.

During the guard stage, when one parent stays with the chick, foraging birds often make relatively short trips close to shore, taking advantage of the productive, deep waters that press right up against the Fiordland coast. Later in the season, and outside breeding, they range much farther offshore. Like other penguins they swallow small prey whole underwater and drink seawater, shedding excess salt through specialized glands above the eyes.

Tawaki breed early, arriving at colonies in mid-to-late winter (around June and July) well ahead of most other penguins. Nests are tucked into sheltered, hidden places: sea caves, rock crevices, hollows beneath boulders, and cavities among the roots of coastal rainforest trees, often several meters up steep, slippery slopes. Colonies are small and loose rather than the dense rookeries of many penguins, with pairs often well spaced and screened by vegetation.

The female usually lays two eggs, but as in other crested penguins the first-laid egg is smaller than the second, and typically only one chick is successfully reared. Both parents share incubation over roughly five to six weeks, taking long alternating shifts. After hatching, the male guards the chick while the female forages, and once the chick is larger it joins other young in loose creches. Chicks fledge in late spring to early summer (around November), after which the adults head to sea to fatten up before returning to molt.

You cannot attract a Fiordland Penguin to a backyard: this is a rare, easily disturbed wild seabird of remote coasts. But it can be seen, responsibly, with planning and a bit of luck. The key is going to the right places in the right season and keeping a respectful distance, since the birds abandon approaches to the nest if disturbed. Here is where and how to look.

• Visit South Westland, New Zealand, where the coast around Munro Beach near Lake Moeraki and the Jackson Bay area offers some of the most accessible mainland viewing during the breeding season.
• Time your trip for the breeding season, roughly July through November, when adults are commuting to shore; birds most often land and depart around dawn and dusk.
• Explore Fiordland by boat, Milford Sound, Doubtful Sound, and Dusky Sound cruises and sea-kayak trips sometimes encounter tawaki swimming or resting on rocks.
• Consider Stewart Island (Rakiura) and its wildlife boat tours, which visit coastlines and islets where the species breeds.
• Join a guided wildlife tour or DOC-informed operator who knows current sites and enforces distance, greatly improving your odds while protecting the birds.
• Keep well back, stay quiet, never block the path between a penguin and the sea, and keep dogs away entirely, since disturbance and predators are serious threats to this vulnerable species.
• Prefer captive viewing instead? A few New Zealand facilities such as the National Aquarium of New Zealand in Napier have held rescued crested penguins, though tawaki are rarely kept and wild viewing is the norm.

• Snares Penguin: Very similar crested penguin but shows bare pink skin at the base of the bill and lacks the cheek streaks; breeds only on the Snares Islands
• Erect-crested Penguin: Larger crested penguin with an upright, brush-like yellow crest rather than a drooping one
• Rockhopper Penguin: Smaller crested penguin with a thinner yellow crest, red eyes, and a distinctive bouncing, hopping gait