This August onwards, Mumbai will host a special set of guests from South America: eight Humboldt penguins who will be part of the permanent exhibit at the Veermata Jijamata Bhosale Udyan, better known the Byculla Zoo.
Brought in from Chile, they will be housed in a special enclosure where the temperature will range from four to eight degrees Celsius. Though the decision to bring them to the zoo was taken in 2015, the Rs 100 crore-plus enclosure and marine aquarium will be ready by August.
The city zoo’s acting director Sanjay Tripathy said, “We are about to complete building a 1,700-sq ft facility, apart from a marine aquarium at Jijamata Udyan. We will initially have eight Humboldt penguins imported from Chile. The indoor facility will maintain temperatures between four and eight degrees Celsius, ideal for these penguins.” Humboldt penguins are medium-sized, growing to 56–70 cm tall and weigh 3.6-5.9 kg.
A 35,000 sq ft aquarium will also be housed on the ground floor of a two-storey building, where the penguin display will be housed. The aquarium is slated to feature 60 species of marine life. “The fish will be housed in three cylindrical tanks and eight rectangular tanks,” Dr Tripathi said.
Humboldt penguins, Dr Tripathi said, are more resilient to warmer temperatures, unlike Antarctic penguins that thrive in sub-zero temperatures. Their backs are black and they have a white frontage. They also display a frontal yellow V-shaped mark. These penguins are also on display at marine aquariums in Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand. This will be the city’s second aquarium after Taraporevala Aquarium on Marine Drive.
The five-year contract for the penguin display as well as the aquarium has been given to an American firm named Sivat and an Australian consultant named Oceanis. Both firms specialise in marine biology, and will provide marine biologists, doctors, and allied staff needed to handle operations of the twin facilities.
A quarantine zone, a feeding zone, a playing area, and other aspects of running the aquarium and penguin display will be set up alongside.
Humboldt penguins are named after the explorer Alexander von Humboldt, a Prussian naturalist and an explorer who pioneered the science of biogeography. The cold water current, which flows north of the west coast of South America from Chile to Peru, is named after him, and these penguins, because they swim in this current, are thus named.
The writer is a freelance journalist
A 35,000 sq ft aquarium will on
the ground floor
and will feature 60 species of marine life
