Shifting ocean currents, which may have carried some of the birds as far north as Brazil’s tropical beaches last year, are also responsible for a drop in the number of the penguins at the Punta Tombo animal preserve.
The population has dwindled from 300,000 breeding pairs 22 years ago to about 200,000 today, according to a University of Washington researcher.
Researcher Dee Boersma told the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science that overfishing of the region’s anchovies means the Magellanic penguins are swimming an additional 25 miles further on average than they did just a decade ago.
'That distance may not sound like much, but they also have to swim another 25 miles back, and (that means) they are swimming that extra 50 miles while their mates are back at the breeding grounds, sitting on the nest and starving,' said Boersma.
She added that heavy rainfall has flooded the nests at the preserve five times over the last 25 years, putting both the eggs and chicks in peril.