Penguine

The largest of the penguin species, the male Emperor stands over forty inches at adulthood and weighs as much as eighty-five pounds, and the female is a bit smaller. Its coloring is similar to the King penguin with blackish head, bluish-dark gray back and white belly with yellow at the ears and throat. Because the species can dive as deep as 700 feet, staying under water for more than fifteen minutes at a time, Emperors dine on larger species than other penguins along with the normal penguin diet of crustaceans, small fish and squid.

Emperors may travel up to sixty miles over ice to reach their breeding grounds in March or April. Here they produce one egg each year. By the time the female is ready to lay her egg in May after a two month gestation period, temperatures have plummeted to -80F and winds reach over 100 miles an hour. It is the male that protects the egg during its entire two-month incubation while the female returns to the sea to feed, fasting for over three months and sacrificing almost half of his body weight to the cause. A nest is not necessary. He keeps the precious egg warm by balancing it on his feet and covering it with a fold of his ample abdominal skin. After the chick hatches, parents take turns with feedings and tending the hatchlings together, before the colony forms the crèche. Come spring as the ice melts, in December and January, when the chicks are old enough to hold their own, the colony returns to the sea.

The Emperor is one of just two species that lives on the sea ice that surrounds mainland Antarctica and is the only one to breed here during the harsh Antarctic winter. It breeds in such places as Enderby, Dronning Maud Land and Princess Elizabeth Land in East Antarctica. The movie was filmed near the French research station on Petral Island in the Adelie Land region of the continent.

Emperors live year-round in the waters of Antarctica, in about forty separate colonies, mostly south of the Atlantic Convergence. The largest concentration is found in the Ross Sea. Colonies exist in locations along both sides of the Antarctic Peninsula including the Dion Islands in Marguerite Bay on the west side and on the east side where a colony of 4,000 breeding pairs was recently discovered at Snow Hill Island. Visitors on Antarctica tours may spot Emperors in the waters between the South Orkney and South Shetland islands or in the Branfield Strait between the Shetlands and the Antarctic Peninsula, though these waters are north of their range.

The Emperor is not considered endangered. An estimated 200,000 to 225,000 pairs inhabit Antarctica, an increase of 50% since the 1970s when a prolonged warming trend dramatically reduced the size of their breeding grounds.