“Penguins go bush”

Penguins go bush! On Saturday 24 October, Thomas joined Kate Rodger on RNZ National’s Saturday Morning to talk about tawaki, New Zealand’s jungle penguins.

In a lively 20 minutes, Kate and Thomas covered why tawaki are so wary of humans, their unusual two-egg strategy, why they’re faring better than hoiho, and their marathon pre-moult journeys of up to 7,000 km to subantarctic waters. Listeners chimed in too, asking about bird flu (tawaki, it turns out, are natural experts at social distancing).

As Thomas said on air, there’s no money for helicopters: our Fiordland work relies on Fiordland Expeditions, who give us access to their boat for free. Thank you again, Richard and Mandy!

Listen to the full interview on RNZ: https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/saturday/audio/2019057204/penguins-go-bush