Living Coasts keepers on chick alert

Zoo keepers at Living Coasts are on high alert for hatching eggs!

Staff are keeping their eye on macaroni penguins and other species at Torquay’s coastal zoo.

Senior keeper Lois Rowell said: “We have five pairs of macaroni penguins on eggs. The first mac eggs could hatch during half term week. This is around the normal time of year for them.”

Macaroni penguins breed on their own rocky beach with a shady sunroof and a special cooling system of water pipes and mist sprays.

As they build nests out of pebbles, the chicks are more easily seen than those of the African penguins, which use burrows dug into the sand of the main beach.

She added: “We have had a fair few Inca tern chicks hatch around the site, we have avocet chicks and more are due to hatch on Waders Estuary. It’s a bit too soon for redshanks, but the auks are displaying and the puffins are nest-building.”

Living Coasts, on the English Riviera, celebrates its tenth birthday this summer. For more information go to www.livingcoasts.org.uk or ring 0844 474 3366.