Birds
Royal Penguin
Eudyptes schlegeli · also called royal
Gathering by the million on a single remote sub-Antarctic island group found almost nowhere else on Earth, a royal penguin crowns itself with a pale golden crest above a strikingly white face, a close relative of the macaroni penguin whose exact species status is still debated.
Overview
The royal penguin, Eudyptes schlegeli, is a crested seabird native to ocean, coastal, and polar habitat centred on a single remote sub-Antarctic island group. Its extraordinarily concentrated breeding range, colonies numbering well over a million birds, and close, still-debated kinship with the macaroni penguin make it one of the more geographically restricted yet numerically enormous seabird populations found anywhere in the Southern Ocean.
An entire species riding on one island group
Few bird species anywhere concentrate their entire global breeding population as tightly as the royal penguin does, a strategy that has produced colonies of staggering size but leaves the species with essentially no fallback if conditions at its single main breeding location were ever to deteriorate.
Status
Near Threatened, with its entire population concentrated almost exclusively at one breeding location despite still numbering in the millions overall.
Royal Penguin: common questions
Where does the royal penguin breed?
This species breeds almost nowhere else on Earth except a single remote sub-Antarctic island group, making its entire global breeding population dependent on the continued health of this one location.
How big are royal penguin colonies?
This species forms colonies of well over a million individual birds at its main breeding site, among the largest single-location seabird gatherings recorded anywhere on the planet.
Is the royal penguin the same species as the macaroni penguin?
This is debated, this species is closely related to the macaroni penguin, and the exact taxonomic relationship between the two has been argued over, with some authorities treating them as separate species and others as subspecies of one another.
Why is the royal penguin considered Near Threatened despite huge numbers?
Royal penguin populations remain concentrated almost entirely at a single breeding location, making the species inherently vulnerable to localised threats despite still numbering in the millions overall.