A colony of fairy penguins that arrived at the Bronx Zoo last year have settled in and welcomed a new baby into the borough.
The zoo debuted a colony of the penguins as a new exhibit in 2015, and on May 10, the birds successfully hatched a chick, marking the first time the species has ever reproduced at the zoo.
Fairy penguins, also known as little blue penguins, only grow to about 13 inches tall and 3 pounds, making them the smallest of the 18 species of penguin.
Chicks weigh about 25 grams as hatchlings, and their downy plumage gets replaced with waterproof feathers when they are about 50 days old.
Both parents take care of and incubate the egg, which is generally hidden under vegetation or in burrows dug in the sand.
The birds are native to New Zealand and the southern coast of Australia. All of the fairy penguins at the Bronx Zoo — except the newborn chick — hatched at the Taronga Zoo in Sydney. They came to the Bronx Zoo as part of a breeding program.
Fairy penguins eat fish, crustaceans and cephalopods, and they generally nest in rocky beach areas or in burrows on sand dunes. However, climate change and human activities are threatening their population in the wild, according to the Wildlife Conservation Society.
The Bronx Zoo is supporting the Taronga Zoo's fairy penguin conservation programs in Sydney Harbor, which consist of breeding programs, awareness campaigns and more.
