Traditional Culture Encyclopedia - Weather forecast - Are there penguins in the Arctic?

Are there penguins in the Arctic?

"No" Netease explored and sorted out that penguins are flightless birds. They walk like waddles in split suits, which is childish. There are nine kinds of penguins in nature, but the ice and snow that most animals can't stand is their home. The snow-covered Antarctic is the main habitat of penguins. In addition to Antarctica, penguins are also distributed on many islands in the southern hemisphere, even on the Galapagos Islands near the equator. However, it is quite puzzling that penguins can't be seen in the Arctic region with the same cold climate and vast ice and snow. The hot weather prevented penguins from migrating northward. Some scientists think that this has to start with their ancestors. The ancestors of penguins are tube-nosed animals, which developed from the south of the equator. Penguins not only decide the direction of development, but also decide where their main home is. Zoologists speculate that they only chose to go south at that time and did not continue to advance north. Because the tropical hot climate blocked their way northward, especially they couldn't stand the warm tropical water. The physiological characteristics of penguins determine that they must stay in the waters where Antarctic ice and snow melt, or in the waters where deep-sea cold water flows. In this way, the warm equatorial airflow and high temperature form a physical barrier, which prevents penguins who are afraid of heat from swimming. Looking back at the distribution of penguins, the northernmost limit of their distribution is the area with an annual average temperature of 20 degrees, which is quite consistent with the speculation of zoologists. The greed of human beings has made innocent penguins extinct, but scientists once found an extinct bird skeleton in the Arctic, which is very similar to penguins. Researchers call it the "big penguin". This giant penguin is about 60 centimeters tall, which is about the same size as the most abundant Adelie penguin in Antarctica. Their heads are brown, their feathers are black and their bellies are white. The skeletal structure of big penguins shows that they also have a clumsy and swaying way of walking, and they are also good at swimming in the sea, which is almost the same as modern penguins. Scandinavia in Europe, the coastal areas of Canada and northern Russia, and all the islands in the North and South Poles are the main distribution areas of giant penguins, which once numbered millions. However, they feed in the ocean and breed on land, and are threatened by both marine and land predators, so their defense ability is poor, which makes them suffer a disastrous defeat in the survival competition of mammals developed in the same period and be swallowed in large quantities; The surviving penguins are also limited to coastal or isolated islands that are less affected by predators. However, humans deprived them of their last chance to survive in the northern hemisphere. When early humans invaded the Arctic region, the calm life of the big penguin began to suffer some damage. By about 1000 years ago, the vikings also discovered this kind of big penguin. They also found that this animal is almost a treasure. To their delight, penguins have no resistance to humans. So, humans began to kill big penguins. Three or four hundred years ago, there was an upsurge of exploring the Arctic in Europe. At the same time, driven by greed and desire, human beings hunt these innocent animals. Large penguins in Greenland, Queen Elizabeth Islands and other places were forced to have nowhere to live, and the number dropped sharply, which eventually led to the "genocide" of large penguins. 1On June 2nd, 844, the last two penguins in the northern hemisphere were arrested and killed on an island in Hainan, Ireland. Now, there are no penguins in the Arctic except the bones occasionally found for human beings to mourn. At present, Antarctica has become an ideal home for penguins: the South Pacific Ocean current where cold and warm meet, the abundant food and nutrients in the sea provide superior conditions for penguins to survive, and the natural barrier formed by the ice and snow plateau prevents animals from migrating to the south, making penguins rarely attacked by predators here. For penguins, the biggest danger here is snowstorm. For penguins, Antarctica has become their safest place to live.