Antarctica Project

Proud Penguins by Kevin

God made penguins to catch their prey easily from the surrounding sea life. Emperor penguins eat squid, which are very slippery and hard to grasp creatures. Penguins, however, have advantages. Their prey cannot squirm out of their mouths because they have spikes on the top of their mouth and their tongue. They also have long beaks to snap up their food. Although squid are very fast, penguins are faster and can swim at speeds of 30 mph. They can dive to depths of 1,500 feet and stay under water for over 18 minutes to catch their food such as squid, shrimp, krill, and small fish. God created these peculiar birds especially unique to catch their food.

Penguins have ferocious enemies. Sea birds hungrily devour penguin eggs before they hatch. They will also feed on unguarded or unwatched chicks. Humans are also an enemy of penguins even when we do not purposely kill them. Sometimes pollution and litter will cause harm to the penguin colony. For instance, in 1989 hundreds of birds died because a massive Argentine oil tanker accidentally spilled 170,000 gallons of gas into the ocean. In addition, tourists visit nesting grounds and penguins become disturbed and leave their nests causing many chicks never to hatch out of their eggs. There are also sea creatures such as killer whales and seals that would love to get a tasty snack like a penguin or two. The worst enemies of the penguin are the leopard seals, which are strong, muscular, swift, and powerful. They are above all the terror of the ocean for the penguin. Sometimes a leopard seal follows a penguin’s shadow as it walks along the ice. Smashing through the ice, the seal will grab the penguin before it knows what happened. Although penguins have fierce enemies, they can swim up to 30 mph if they need to escape their predators.

Mother and father penguins care for their babies. Both males and females spend months feeding at the ocean because they will not eat for a long time to come. Once they dine, they head back to their nesting ground where they will choose a mate and the females will lay the egg. The mother penguin keeps the egg in a tuft of fur hanging down from the bottom of her stomach to her feet. This extra flap of fur protects the egg and the chick from the cold, freezing winter. Carefully, the mother trades the egg to the father penguin. Sometimes they are too eager and will let the egg stay out too long or will lose it. Others who are patient will trade the egg successfully. After the trading, the mother will return to the sea to feed. The father now has the egg and he and all the other male penguins stay in a huge huddle to keep warm. They will have to endure one of the toughest ordeals in the world: the Antarctic winter. The father penguins will suffer for one speck of life inside a tiny shell. The temperature can reach 100 degrees below freezing, the winds around them can reach a speed of 150 mph, and snow can fall several feet per day. Yet the father perseveres for the egg. When the egg hatches, the mother returns and regurgitates partially digested food into the chick’s mouth. The father returns to the sea to feed after two months of not eating. The penguin parents are proud of their chick, which they have both brought into the world.

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New Zealand Pavlova!

Simply Spectacular by Haley

Did you know that a blue whale’s spout can reach up to 30 feet high in the air? A killer whale’s fin alone can stand to six feet tall! Whales are called cetaceans (see tay’ shuhns) because they come from Kingdom Animalia, phylum Chordata, class Mammalia, and finally order Cetacea. Cetaceans are split into two groups: toothed whales and baleen whales. Toothed whales obviously have teeth and baleen whales have brushes like a giant toothbrush. It is fascinating that cetaceans protect each other from their human enemies, have a built-in sonar detector, and migrate thousands of miles to give birth to their young.

In the 18th and 19th centuries whaling was a popular but dangerous job. Whales were hunted for their blubber and a substance inside of them that made oil for lamps and extremely expensive perfume. It was a risky job, but it was also high-paying. Those who were willing to take the risk paddled small boats out to sea and attached harpoons to ropes which were then fastened to the boats. Having learned their migration routes, the whalers sat there, watching and waiting for a whale to surface to breath. Although sperm and right whales were the whaler’s favorite catches, gray whales were a fine catch too, yet very fierce. They were so ferocious that the whalers trembled with fear when they found one. Whales are very loyal and protective over each other and, when found, they would give a warning cry that could be heard for miles around to keep other whales away from that area. If a whale had its young with her, it would fight to the death to protect its calf. After a while the poor whale, hurt and exhausted, would give up to its enemies. Today, there are conservation laws against whaling, but, sadly, the damage has already been done and many species of whales are in danger of extinction.

Toothed whales have a system, called echolocation, for navigation and hunting. A special sound sent out by the melon, a rounded structure in the forehead, hits something and bounces back to the whale. The whale can tell if prey or predators are up ahead. Also, whales can tell the size, shape, and the location of the object. They can tell how far off the shore is or how deep the ocean is in a particular spot. Jacques Yves Cousteau discovered this when he was sailing on the best course through the Strait of Gibraltar and noticed a group of porpoises tailing his ship. Suddenly, he had a brilliant idea. He changed course a few degrees, and the porpoises pursued him for a couple minutes but then turned back to the better course. Cousteau thus concluded that toothed whales had a sort of sonar system. We now know this to be their extraordinary system of echolocation.

Whales migrate to warmer waters in the winter to have their babies. Since there will be no food in the warmer waters, the mother whale gorges on food all summer long, storing up blubber that she will live off in the winter. Journeying with the herd of whales, the pregnant mother sacrificially denies herself her own blubber and eats only when she absolutely has to, because she knows that soon she will have her calf nursing off of her. When she finally arrives and her young is born, she immediately helps it up to the surface to breath. The mother’s milk glands are in a little spot near the tail where the calf latches on and hitches a ride. Whales are truly great mothers. The young does not usually leave its mother for years after its birth, therefore, the two get very attached to each other. She teaches her calf to hunt and fight and to be a great whale. Soon they must make the long and dangerous journey back home with the herd of whales. The mother, who is now growing weak from her calf feeding off of her, may fall behind which is very dangerous. Killer whales are just waiting for a chance like this. The calf, adding to his mother’s fatigue, will presently get tired and piggyback on his mother’s back. Finally, when they return to cool waters the mother whale eats and is now able to protect her young.

In the end, we can clearly see that whales are amazing creatures. Unfortunately, in the 1700’s and 1800’s whales were hunted almost to extinction until conservation laws protecting whales were established. We can thank Thomas Edison for inventing the light bulb so that oil lamps are no longer needed! The toothed whales’ echolocation system, enabling them to know the exact size and shape of something even if they can’t see it, is truly astonishing. However, the most remarkable feature of all is the mother whale’s love for her young, sacrificing everything for her calf even if it means her life. Surely, cetaceans are simply spectacular in every way.

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