Rumicha the baby penguin has had her very first swim! Rumicha, which means pebble in Quechua language, is the youngest member of the Humboldt penguin family at Oregon Zoo. She is now interacting more with care staff as she gets older, but she’s still in the nest with her parents most of the time.
However, she’s now taking her first steps - or rather strokes - towards independence by venturing into the water. The young penguin hatched on 29 March — the first Humboldt chick to hatch at the Oregon Zoo since 2020 and the 192nd since the zoo began breeding the threatened species in the 1980s. She’s growing fast will be nearly as tall as the adult penguins soon, but still easy to tell apart by her plumage.
Young Humboldts don’t develop their distinctive black-and-white tuxedo markings for a couple of years. Once she’s waddling and swimming on her own, the chick will begin to explore the rugged terrain of the zoo’s Penguinarium which simulates the endangered birds’ native habitat along the South American coastline off of Peru and Chile.
Humboldt penguins are classified as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, and in 2010 were granted protection under the U.S. Endangered Species Act. Of the world’s 17 penguin species, Humboldts are among the most at risk, as the wild population is estimated at 32,000 adult birds and declining.