Antarctica: Wildlife

A moulting gentoo

For the rest of our landings, we were entertained by the Antarctic wildlife. We saw three types of penguins: gentoo, adelie, and chinstrap, and by far, the most fun were the gentoo. They were very curious and if you sat still for a long time, they would come up to check you out.

The adelies were the quietest and easiest to scare. We had to be very quiet and give them lots of space to keep them from waddling away. We only saw a few adelies because they don't normally come as far south.

The chinstrap were the last penguin species we saw and they were adorable the way they would hop around in the snow.

A curious gentoo who visited us
after we waited very patiently without moving!

Adelie Penguins

Chinstrap Penguins

The animal that penguins did not want to see was the leopard seal, one of the top predators in Antarctica. The female leopard seal is bigger than the male and she always looks like she's smiling. We saw a few leopard seals on icebergs, but it was most exciting when we saw one swimming. They like to eat penguins, so the penguins quickly got up on shore if they saw a leopard seal swim by (leopard seals are faster than penguins in the water but penguins are faster than seals on land).

A group of Crabeater seals

Two other seals we saw were weddle seals, which are quite large and have cat-like faces and whiskers, and crabeater seals, that are smaller and lighter in colour. They each eat fish and krill (a shrimp-like creature), so the penguins don't worry too much about getting close to them. We also saw fur seals, and learned that they are actually sea lions that were misnamed.

Fur Seal (that's actually a sea lion)

From the deck of the ship and the zodiac boats, we saw three whale species: fin, humpback and minke. I only saw the fin whale once and it was very large. We saw lots of humpbacks from the ship and the zodiacs, and it was really fascinating to see them breach (when they jump out of the water and slam into it again with the sides of their bodies). We also saw them feeding on krill where they kind of roll around flapping their big fins. The most exciting time we saw them was when we were in the zodiac and one starting swimming right towards us with its back fin out of the water.

A Humpback Whale

My favourite whale was the minke whale because they like to follow boats that are moving and jump alongside them. They are more slender and have a rusty colour along their sides.

There are a few other bird species (other than penguins) that we saw flying around the ship or across the water. The most exciting to watch is the albatross, which can have a wingspan of 3.5 m long!

I can now really appreciate how much space these animals are used to having in the wild and it makes me think about how much space we give them at the zoo. I hope their enclosures give them lots of enrichment and that they have as much fun as we have watching them.