🎧 Penguin Island 2010

EP1. Love Is In The Air

There’s a very special island off the south coast of Australia where thousands of penguins come to breed.
and thousands of people come to watch.
Unique to this corner of our planet, the smallest of all penguin species, the Little Penguin, is battling to survive in a human world.
But a dedicated team of scientists has sworn to guard them from people, predators.
and this year, from the hottest summer since records began.
As starving chicks struggle to hang on and their parents scour the oceans for a dwindling supply of fish, what will it take to protect the pocket-sized creatures of Penguin Island?
Late in the afternoon, and the last chance for a Little Penguin called Bluey to grab a bite to eat before heading home for the night.
Bluey might spend days, even weeks, out at sea.
But he’ll always eventually come back to the same beach at the largest protected Little Penguin colony in the world, on Phillip Island, Australia .
and there’ll be busloads of admirers to welcome him home.
Penguin fans pour in from round the world.

breed v. 繁殖；培养；饲养；训练
dedicated adj. 全心全意的；忠诚的；专心的；献身的
swear v. 发誓；宣誓；保证；断言 (swear-swore-sworn)
chick n. 小鸡；小鸟；幼兽；幼畜
hang on v. 坚持；继续；悬挂；坚持住
scour v. 彻底检查；彻底搜索；彻底搜查
dwindle v. 缩小；减少；衰落；衰退
grab a bite to eat v. 简单吃点东西；匆忙吃点便餐
colony n. 殖民地；群体；团体；一群
Phillip Island n. 菲利普岛；菲利普岛（澳大利亚维多利亚州的一个岛屿）
busload n. 一车乘客；一车人；一车旅客
pour in v. 涌入；流入；涌入；流入

Everybody wants to catch a glimpse of these cute Aussie animals.
I come from China.
Yeah, I’m from Germany.
Bavaria.
Taiwan.
From the United States of America.
Kansas City, Missouri.
Yeah, we want to see the penguins! I’m excited.
We came all the way to see the penguins.
Because in Taiwan we don’t have penguins.
Oh, we just love the penguins.
The Little Penguins for the last few hours have actually been forming groups called “rafts” and the reason they form these groups is for safety in numbers.
So, if we can ask you all to please be nice and quiet and stay seated and watch these Little Penguins coming ashore.
You can hear a pin drop as everyone waits for the first penguin to show.
Penguins are nervy little things.

catch a glimpse of v. 瞥见；瞥到；瞥到一眼
Aussie adj. 澳大利亚的；澳大利亚人的；澳大利亚人的 n. 澳大利亚人
Bavaria n. 巴伐利亚（德国南部的一个州）
Kansas City n. 堪萨斯城（美国密苏里州的一个城市）
Missouri n. 密苏里州（美国中西部的一个州）
raft n. 筏；木排；浮筏；浮排
ashore adv. 到岸；上岸；到岸边；到岸上
nervy adj. 紧张的；焦虑的；不安的；紧张不安的

Faced with a predator on land, they’d stand no chance of making a run for it, so they won’t risk coming out of the water till dark.
Penguin! Amazingly, the quick dash across the beach that Bluey and his pals make every night generates a cool 16,000 tourist pounds each year, and that’s for every penguin.
Once the penguins go offstage, the audience return to their comfy hotels.
What they don’t get to see is this, the remarkable private life of Australia’s Little Penguin.
It takes Bluey an hour to climb up from the beach to his old burrow in the garden of a cliff-top beach house.
Last year, he raised two healthy chicks here with his long-term mate, Sheila.
Penguin partners separate over winter, and it’s been weeks since he last saw Sheila.
Now spring is coming, penguins return to the colony to meet and mate near their old burrows.
But there’s no sign of Bluey’s Sheila yet.

stand no chance of .. 没有机会
make a run for it .. (突然)逃跑
quick dash across the beach 快速穿过海滩
pal n. 伙伴；朋友
go offstage 走到台下
comfy adj. 舒适的；舒服的；安逸的
burrow n. 洞穴；地洞；巢穴
cliff-top beach 悬崖顶海滩
separate over winter 在冬天分开
mate v. 使结合；使成对；使成配偶；使成配偶

A hundred yards away, penguins are still clocking in.
This route home bypasses all the tourists.
Right at the back, a weary female begins the long hike up the cliff.
Penguins have an acute visual memory for landmarks at sea and on land.
She’s picking up the pace.
She remembers her way home.
Sheila and Bluey are reunited at last.
They celebrate with the Little Penguin’s unique courtship shuffle and then get down to business starting a new family.
The penguin breeding season has officially begun.
Little Penguins have adapted to live along the warm southern coastline of Australia.
For thousands of years, they dug their burrows all over the coast of Phillip Island, until human settlement started to gobble up their habitat.

clocking in 记录时间；（上班）打卡
bypass v. 绕过；避开；迂回；绕道
weary adj. 疲倦的；累的；厌倦的；疲倦的
pick up the pace 加快步伐
courtship shuffle 求偶舞
get down to business 开始做某事
gobble up v. 吞噬；吞没；吞食；吞没

Now the island’s last remaining penguin colony clings to one rocky peninsula.
And that’s where Bluey and Sheila have made their burrow.
It’s a prime sea-view location for a penguin hideaway.
All new building has been stopped here and the remaining houses slowly removed.
This will be the last season when people and penguins live together, because the island peninsula has been designated a fully protected nature park.
The park already has its own research facility, where critical penguin study has been conducted since 1968.
Top animal biologists now flock here from across the world.
For the first party I’ve made a list of the birds that were breeding.
These experts know there’s much more to the Little Penguin than its cuddly public image.
Perceived as cute fluffy, furry little animals, and once you meet them, they’re the toughest creatures and they have the hardest life, and you can’t not admire that.

cling to v. 粘附；依附；坚持；紧握
peninsula n. 半岛；半岛地区；半岛地带
prime adj. 最好的；极好的；首要的；主要的
hideaway n. 避难所；藏身之处；隐居处；藏匿处
designated adj. 指定的；任命的；指定的；指定的
critical adj. 关键的；重要的；批评的；批评性的
conduct v. 进行；实施；管理；指挥；引导；带领；
flock v. 聚集；成群；成群结队；成群结队地
cuddly adj. 令人想拥抱的；喜欢搂搂抱抱的；逗人喜爱的
squeak v. 吱吱叫；吱吱声；吱吱作响
perceived as v. 被认为是；被看作是；被视为
fluffy adj. 蓬松的；毛茸茸的；柔软的

No-one knows penguins like Marg Healy.
She runs the park’s wildlife hospital.
I cut my hand yesterday, and he keeps scratching me right where the cut is, like they know.
She nurses dozens of birds back to health every year and has grown to love and respect them.
Every single penguin I’ve ever met is different.
They really are.
They might look the same to other people, but I can pick penguins by looking at their facial features.
If you’ve ever had a dog, you know that that dog is not going to be the same as any other dog you ever meet.
You’re full.
You are.
Marg provides whatever the animals need to make a speedy recovery.
What are you doing, Jack? You’re nocturnal.
You’re nocturnal! It’s really hard for babies in care, because they’re so lonely.

facial features n. 面部特征；面部表情
speedy adj. 迅速的；快速的
nocturnal adj. 夜行的；夜间的；夜间活动的

And they actually need nurturing like sort of small children.
Springtime on Penguin Island means love is in the air.
It’s time to check up on some of the 13,000 penguin couples that breed here, in one of the planet’s most-studied penguin colonies.
Field researcher Leanne Renwick examines Bluey to see if he’s got what it takes to raise a new penguin family.
This male weighs almost one and a half kilograms, so for an adult male at this time of year that’s a really nice weight.
He’s big and fat and healthy.
I guess it just shows that he can catch food so therefore will be able to provide for his chicks.
Scientists have now amassed more than 40 years’ worth of data on the personal life of the Little Penguin.
This is a scanner.
See, most of the penguins here now actually have a microchip inserted just under the surface of the skin, and that’s a way that we can identify each individual.
For some, home is a wooden nest box installed by scientists trying to safeguard the penguin habitat.

nurture v. 培养；教育；养育；抚育
most-studied adj. 研究最多的；最被研究的
field researcher 野外研究员；实地研究员
amass v. 积累；聚集；收集；搜集

Wherever they’ve built new facilities for tourists or where natural burrows are scarce, they’ve placed artificial burrows to encourage penguins to live close by.
Like behind the kitchens at the visitor cafe, a successful new penguin housing project.
After dark, the so-called Penguin Cafe springs into life as the males begin sparring for the best-dressed females and the best-appointed love nests.
Penguins who live here are certainly not shy.
They’ve grown used to the bright lights and the clatter of human activity.
And in the breeding season, they give as good as they get.
Too bad if you want a quiet cuppa after work! Once they’ve claimed a nest box, penguins won’t tolerate uninvited guests.
This is Rocky.
He’s a three-year-old ready to start a family.
He’s fitted out an A1 love nest.
Now he just needs someone to share it with.
Being a bit on the chubby side is the secret to attracting a mate.
It shows you’re a successful fisherman and can provide for a family.
Tonight, the boys are scoring left right and centre .

scarce adj. 缺乏的；稀少的；不足的；稀有的
spring into life 突然活跃起来；突然开始活动；突然开始工作；突然开始运转
spar v. 争吵；争论；辩论；争吵；争论；辩论
best-appointed 最好的；最合适的；最合适的；最合适的
love nest n. 爱巢；爱窝；爱巢；爱窝
clatter n. 嘈杂声；嘈杂；嘈杂声；嘈杂
cuppa n. [俚语] 一杯茶；一杯咖啡；一杯茶；一杯咖啡
fit out 装备；配备；装饰；布置

everyone, that is, except for Rocky.
Oh, and the cafe’s perennial bachelor, Spike, who’s constantly nest-building.
Spike is already two years old.
He’s determined, all right, but, it seems, a bit dim-witted, and he too is yet to find a mate.
He’s watched all the home-improvement shows, it seems.
He thinks he’s quite the catch.
But, erm, not for that one.
It’s back to the renovations for Spike.
Which penguin will be first to find their perfect match, fastidious Spike or fat Rocky?
Two weeks later, and spring has truly sprung at the cliff-top burrow.
Bluey is sitting on two new eggs that Sheila has laid.
She’s gone to sea.
Now she’s 30 miles offshore looking for fish.
They can only hunt one at a time, and soon they’ll have two hungry mouths to feed.
Meanwhile, Bluey is minding their precious eggs.
He’s not the only one that’s housebound.

perennial adj. 持久的；长期的；永久的；
bachelor n. 单身汉；鳏夫；
dim-witted adj. 愚蠢的；迟钝的；笨拙的；
home-improvement show 家庭装修节目；家庭装修秀
quite the catch 非常吸引人；非常优秀（尤其是在恋爱或婚姻的语境下，表示是个很不错的对象）
renovation n. 翻新；修理；
fastidious adj. 挑剔的；讲究的；吹毛求疵的；
spring-sprang/sprung-sprung n. 春天； v. 突然开始；
housebound adj. 居家不外出的,不能离家的

All over the colony, penguin mums and dads take turns to keep their eggs warm and protected from predators for 35 long days, until they hatch.
Bluey has a human neighbour, Elizabeth Lundahl Hegedus, although she will be leaving in six months.
Her house is to be demolished as part of the grand plan to make this a complete penguin sanctuary.
Already her garden is full of breeding pairs.
There are penguins all over the whole area.
Wherever you see this vegetation over there, there, there’d be penguin burrows spread out.
It’s been more than 30 years since Elizabeth first came from Sweden to live on this exposed outpost in Australia.
Oh, there’s a penguin, possibly sitting on eggs.
It’s got a very good, solid beak, which indicates that it’s a male, and he’s getting a bit worried.
We’ve got the two artificial burrows over here.
They’ve got eggs there, normally they will stay with the egg for three or four days each.
Obviously, they don’t like having their roof suddenly opened up.
I wouldn’t, either.
Penguins like Bluey try to raise two chicks each season.

demolish v. 拆除；毁坏；破坏；拆除；毁坏；破坏
sanctuary n. 避难所；
outpost n. 哨所；前哨；前哨站；
breeding pair 繁殖对；繁殖伴侣；繁殖伴侣；繁殖伴侣

On average, only one will survive.
Bluey’s hungry, but he must guard the eggs till Sheila gets back tonight.
Anyway, the beach is a no-go zone during the day.
It’s dangerous out there.
The skies are full of gulls that will swoop on any unsuspecting prey.
In broad daylight, there is just nowhere to hide.
Bluey will not budge an inch.
And he cannot leave his precious eggs for one second.
Careless parents who go looking for food leave behind a power breakfast for egg thieves like these hungry silver gulls.
GULLS SQUAWK Even copperhead snakes will case a penguin burrow on the off chance of a quick feed.
But not on Bluey’s watch.
Hopefully, the relief guard will be on her way soon.
Penguins are starting to raft up before coming ashore.
Maybe Sheila will be among them.
Some are already approaching the Parade beach.
Like many island locals, Elizabeth works here as a Parade guide.
You know that it’s not till quarter past seven? Yeah.
Yeah, good! They sort of looked expectant, and they’ve got another 25 minutes to go before somebody’s going to turn up, so! But there’s a catch to this line of work.

no-go zone 禁区；禁入区
gull n. 海鸥；
swoop v. 俯冲；
prey n. 猎物；
broad adj. 宽的；
case v. 调查；研究；检查；
not budge an inch 一动不动
copperhead snake 铜头蛇；
on the off chance of 怀着微弱的希望
expectant adj. 期待的；期望的；

Pesky people, mostly.
The penguins are always nice.
Even when they bite you, they’ve got a good reason for it.
RADIO: ‘We’re going to open the doors in a minute.
‘ So, now you get the stampede.
You go sideways round No penguins come up in the middle.
Each night, without fail, the penguins shoot straight past the gawping masses and trundle on with their busy lives.
365 days a year, evening rush hour passes across Elizabeth’s front lawn, with a steady stream of honking commuter traffic.
Bluey waits patiently for Sheila.
Fossil records show that at least 65 million years ago, penguins traded in their wings for flippers, which means the only way up those cliffs is on foot.
For many, it’s a half a mile to reach their burrows.
That’s a huge trek if your legs are only two inches long.
Meanwhile, back at the Penguin Cafe, a group of eligible females arrives.
With any luck, one will be Spike’s perfect match.
This is Tash.
She lost her chicks last year when food ran short.
Now she’s looking for a new partner to try again.
an older divorcee - could be bachelor Spike’s lucky night.

pesky adj. 讨厌的；令人恼火的；令人讨厌的；
stampede n. 人群；
gawping adj. 凝视的；
mass adj. 大量的；
trundle v. 缓慢移动；
honk v. 鸣叫；
commuter traffic 通勤交通；
trade in their wings for flippers 用翅膀换取脚蹼
trek n. 艰苦跋涉
eligible adj. 合格的；符合条件的

Courtship is notoriously rowdy.
Only when they actually start mating do things quieten down.
Penguins don’t have external sex organs like mammals.
It’s believed that Spike’s flipper beating and back massage stimulate Tash.
Their reproductive tracts, called cloacas, come together for all of a second, and hey presto, sperm is transferred.
Once they’ve mated, males jealously guard their females.
With no time to get her back to his carefully prepared pad, Spike quickly bundles Tash into the nearest empty nest box, out the way of any rivals.
It takes a moment for young Spike to realise that nest box is not in fact empty.
And that flipper-beating sound coming from inside is a really bad sign.
Spike can only take so much.
Suddenly it’s pandemonium at Box 1/62.
The penguin inside is none other than Rocky, Spike’s neighbour and rival.
It’s the usual fight for boxes, burrows and birds, and 13mm of razor-sharp beak can be a deadly weapon.
The fight continues outside.
And just when the fellas are flagging, Tash rushes out and joins in.
Having mated with both males, she’s not sure just who goes with who right now. 😶

courtship n. 求爱；
rowdy adj. 吵闹的；喧闹的；; n. 粗暴的人，好吵闹的人
mammal n. 哺乳动物；
stimulate v. 刺激；激励；
reproductive tract 生殖器官；
cloaca n. 泄殖腔；
presto v. 突然发生；
sperm n. 精液；
bundle v. 捆绑；包裹；捆绑；包裹
out the way of any rivals 避开任何竞争对手
none other than 正是；恰好是；不是别人，正是..
pandemonium n. 混乱；
razor-sharp adj. 锋利的；锐利的；
beak n. 鸟嘴；
flagging adj. 疲倦的；

Spike settles it and shoves Tash into a box that IS actually empty.
Rocky is still short of a soul mate.
And now those two newlyweds really rub his beak in it.
They’re at it again! Not far away, in Elizabeth’s garden, Bluey, the loyal dad left to guard the eggs, is still home alone, waiting for his partner, Sheila, to return from her fishing trip.
And then something starts to stir beneath him.
The first little chicks of the season are set to make their grand entrance.
With a birth weight of just 45 grams, Sammy, the first hatchling, must try and eat his way to more than a kilo to increase his chances of survival at sea.
He and his little brother, Tom, are very hungry now, but their father hasn’t eaten in days.
They need their mum, Sheila.
By the time Elizabeth turns in, Sheila is still not back.
It looks like Bluey’s on his own again for another long night.
A night-vision camera shows us what happens next.
A fox has got in behind Elizabeth’s house.
In desperation, Bluey tries to conceal his tiny chicks.
It is little protection.
A prowling fox could take them all in a flash.
Next morning, word spreads that a fox has been stalking through the colony.
We’ve had instances where a fox has come out here at night, and they can sometimes kill 30 or 50 penguins in a night.
It’s horrific.
And they tend not to eat them, either.

short of 缺少；不足；
newlywed adj. 新婚的；
rub v. 摩擦；
stir v. 搅拌；搅动
make ones grand entrance 隆重登场；
hatchling n. 雏鸟；
conceal v. 隐藏；隐瞒；
in a flash 突然；
prowl v. 巡逻；
word spreads 传播；
spree n.狂欢、作乐

You just turn up in the morning and there’s just dead penguins everywhere, basically.
They soon find evidence of the predator’s killing spree.
As she does her morning rounds, Leanne checks on Bluey’s burrow.
I actually think that I can hear tiny little chicks.
Bluey and the chicks have escaped the fox for now.
This chick is probably about a day, one, one or two days old.
And hopefully Sheila will make it back to feed her hungry family.
So, it weighs 53 grams.
The little hatchlings won’t last another night.
They desperately need their mother home with food.
But first, she’ll have to make it past the fox.
Penguin parents scurry home as quickly as they can.
Struggling to catch up is a female penguin weighed down with fish.
Sheila is back at last, with her devoted partner, Bluey, and two new offspring.
From now on, the couple will take it in turns to baby-sit, heading off for one or two days at a time to find fish.
And Bluey can at last go and feed himself.
The kids are not the only ones who are starving.
Sheila now gives the boys regular feeds.
They’ve already survived gulls, snakes and a prowling fox, but they are vulnerable while stuck on land, unable to feed or move fast from predators.
And they’ve got another eight weeks of it before they grow strong enough to feed themselves out there in Australia’s Southern Ocean.
Bluey’s got his work cut out for him, too.
Trawling the oceans for fish for the family for two whole months is no mean feat.
But they’re plucky things, Australia’s Little Penguins.
Next on Penguin Island, chicks Sammy and Tom are old enough to be left home alone.
It’s time for the two young brothers to meet their fans.
But sometimes, people and penguins come too close.
Then all of a sudden, there’s a life to save on Penguin Island.

spree n.狂欢、作乐
morning rounds 早晨巡逻；
scurry v. 匆忙地移动；
offspring n. 后代；
get ones work cut out for oneself 有困难；面临艰巨的任务或挑战
no mean feat 不是一件容易的事；
plucky adj. 勇敢的，有勇气的，大胆的

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EP2. Danger in the Penguin Colony

There’s a very special island off the south coast of Australia, where thousands of penguins come to breed, and thousands of people come to watch. Unique to this corner of our planet, the smallest of all penguin species, the Little Penguin, is battling to survive in a human world. But a dedicated team of scientists has sworn to guard them from people, predators, and this year, from the hottest summer since records began. As starving chicks struggle to hang on, and their parents scour the oceans for a dwindling supply of fish, what will it take to protect these pocket-sized creatures? This week, chicks Sammy and Tom are old enough to be left home alone. It’s time for the two young brothers to meet their fans. But sometimes, humans and penguins get too close. And now, there’s a life to save on Penguin Island. Like much of Australia’s coastline, by day Summerland’s beach is a playground for surfers and sunbathers. And every evening, the beach is closed. At night, this place belongs to the island’s many animals. But most of all, it belongs to penguins. Now three weeks old, penguin chicks Sammy and Tom have guzzled their way to an incredible ten times their birth weight. This pair would eat all night if you let them, so their parents have no choice but to fish all day. Their mum, Sheila, is one of the first adults to return home to the colony after dark. She’s got a bellyful of fish, so it’s tucker time, fellas! There’s no let-up for penguin parents. Getting fed is a matter of life and death for chicks. No time for table manners! By 3 in the morning, the larder’s empty and this exhausted mother has no choice but to go and find more, if she wants her chicks to survive. The boys spend the day lounging indoors. Though only a day older, Sammy is growing faster than his brother Tom and accommodation is getting increasingly cramped. The family burrow is in the front garden of one of the old houses, in a once busy area known as the Summerland Estate. Building your own home in Summerlands used to be a dream for many young couples. You could pick up a bargain block of land with a million-dollar view. Only problem - thousands of penguins lived there already. When we first got here, we couldn’t sleep at four, or five, or six, it was so noisy. PENGUINS CALL NOISILY Shut up! Visitors say, “how on earth can you sleep with this racket going on all night?” “Rrrrr, rrrrr!” under the house and it’s like a drum, because there’s just, um boards, bare boards and nothing underneath. So, it’s pretty noisy. It might not be the quietest place for a holiday house, but the kids love it. And now there’s a mother sitting on eggs in here. No. Though the park rangers and penguins would prefer it if you left their nestboxes alone! There’s an egg there. For years, people and penguins just accepted that they each had unusual neighbours. Yeah, having penguins live under your house, that’s pretty novel, isn’t it? Affectionately termed “The penguin house”. It was the cars and the pets that caused the problem. And when numbers dropped at the nightly penguin parade, it was down to biologist Peter Dann to do something about it. At the time we had 180 houses, which usually meant 180 dogs and probably 180 cats. Probably, you know, 300 cars. Something like that. There were hundreds of penguins killed in the housing estate each year. The radical solution? Remove the residents, remove their cars and, eventually, all the homes. Now the housing estate is a ghost town. The first time a human settlement has been removed for a single animal species, and that’s anywhere in the world. Though Peter can do much to keep penguins safe from humans on land, it’s a lot harder to protect them out at sea, where they spend half their lives facing many dangers. A penguin’s nearly drowned after getting caught in fishing line. Nylon cord had knotted around his left foot. It’s straight to hospital for this fella, by penguin ambulance. Look at his foot, it’s just really abnormal. Yeah, just massively swollen, the poor thing. They give him antibiotics and anti-inflammatories. But this new patient is a big concern for wildlife carer, Marg Healy. I’m very worried about him, because he’d be in huge amounts of pain. If you can imagine having an elastic band around a finger or something, for weeks, and your finger is actually about to fall off. To help the swelling go down, they’ll give him regular swims in the hospital pool. And a nickname - this penguin is now known as Foot. A day later, and it’s Marg’s job to fish him out after his morning swim. Don’t do that! But Foot doesn’t want Marg anywhere near his sore leg. And he’s got an understandable aversion to fishing equipment. He’s not happy to be here. Penguins are tough. Wild animals don’t show any pain or fear, because they get eaten. The blood supply has been cut and the limb is dying. It’s agony for Foot. With the drug regime we’ve had him on, it hasn’t really worked. Marg needs some specialist advice. It’s very nasty. You’re a little fatty, aren’t you? He is. The potential of a bone infection starting and becoming systemic, like going through the whole system, is huge if it’s left like this, because it’s a dead foot. The foot will eventually drop off and bacteria can get into the end of the bone. Poor little guy. Ow! Did you want to knock him out and x-ray him? Yeah, we can certainly x-ray it. Yeah, for sure. Come out the back. He is really going to fight. It takes twice the normal amount of anaesthetic to sedate Foot. This is the one. The actual joint looks There is no choice. To end his pain, they must amputate. It’s either that or he won’t survive. We would have to euthanase, and we actually know that penguins can survive with a partial foot, or a very long stump. They don’t use that foot when they swim, at all. Their flippers are their wings. It’s a delicate operation, cutting away all the dead stuff, but trying to keep enough healthy tissue to protect the limb. There we go. Now you can have it. Good man. Well done, sweetie. Foot is already trying to stand. It’s a good sign that he may soon be able to walk again. Well, he’s putting weight on it nicely there. I’m hopeful now. All righty, so Clavulox, seven days? Yes. All right, thank you. Night closes in on the island. Soon, penguin parents are returning to feed their young. The two chicks, Sammy and Tom, line up for dinner - like every other ravenous youngster in the colony. They jostle for pole position in the nightly race for food. Adult penguins can recognise the unique call of their offspring, but chicks can only guess who’s Mum or Dad. So they try every passing parent. Bluey, Sammy and Tom’s father, has just come ashore. He still has a 100-metre cliff to climb. Last chance to catch his breath. Up top, they’re already under starter’s orders. Every weary adult must run the gauntlet of other penguins’ pushy chicks. They fight you on the beaches, they fight you in the burrows. Hold the line if you can! Don’t give in to surprise attack! The worst cases of parent abuse take place round the nestboxes behind the tourist kitchens, known as the Penguin Cafe. Here, thuggish chicks outnumber beleaguered mums and dads by five to one, and they gang up on them mercilessly. Sometimes they forget who are the grown-ups and who are the kids. Rocky’s a young male who’s a bit of a late developer, still busy tarting up his nestbox, still trying to find Mrs Right to move in with him. Maybe, if he waits in his ideal penguin home, love will come knocking. At last, a young female comes to check out his nestbox. Could she be the girl of his dreams, the mother of his chicks? But Rocky’s not the only male on the prowl. The female seems taken with Rocky’s love-pad. But now she wants to see his dance moves. Everything’s going Rocky’s way when a rival male stops the party. And carries on where Rocky left off. Once again, Rocky is left out in the cold. When will this unlucky seabird find a mate? Meanwhile, Sammy and Tom are still waiting at the head of the dinner queue. Hang on, could this be Mum right now? But this female has had one too many meal requests from strangers. A night vision camera shows what happens next. The boys think it’s Mum, and they start begging. But she’s not their mum and she punishes them cruelly for their mistake. Bluey, their dad, is halfway up the hill when he hears his chicks screaming. Now she’s got Sammy by the flipper. Bluey rushes in to sort things out. No-one messes with Bluey’s boys! Now Dad’s back, they get the treat they’ve been waiting for all night. The penguins share their island with other animals and birds. Marg admits a new patient to the hospital - a pelican that flew into power lines and is now too traumatised to even eat. With seabirds, the really key thing is to manage stress and to understand that each animal that comes in is an individual with individual problems, and not tr and treat it like just an animal. You know, sort of understand its issues. But stress is the huge thing and that’s things like being very quiet, giving them huge amounts of time during the day to be not disturbed, so that they can rest and build up their energy. Hi, sweetie. As for Foot, well, he’s already getting some of his fight back and that’s just a day after his operation. It takes two to change his bandage. The wound is actually bleeding a bit. He’s such a struggling bird to feed. He’s pulling at the stitches while he’s trying to get away from me. So we’re going to keep it bandaged for a couple of days until it seals up a bit. Thank you very much. Thank you. Yeah, thanks for that. Foot’s not the only noisy one. There’s long-term patient, Jonathan, a silver gull, who was rescued as a chick and is still here eight weeks later. He’s totally recovered and should be long gone, but this noisy seabird has grown a little too accustomed to the after-care. Well, you’ve been fed, four times. Foot can’t keep his food down. He’s not eating anywhere near enough to pull through. Is it going to stay down there? No, here it comes again. Sweetheart, don’t do that. OK, if you really want to, I’ll help. OK, right. And his first attempt at walking doesn’t look at all promising. Marg can only wash his beak and pray that he’ll turn the corner soon. Well, I didn’t know he was that stressed. Just hope I can get drugs into him. They recover usually so well. Yeah, they don’t normally vomit. So, anyway, we can only wait and see and do what we can. You go and play with Jan. Can he play with you for a while? Thank you. Now that the government has bought up all the houses in a compulsory purchase scheme, the old estate is virtually deserted. A solitary family enjoy a last summer stroll before their house is demolished to make room for the penguins. Look at the baby’s head. She’s sitting on him. We’ll miss all this and the views. We probably can’t come here unless we’re here for a penguin parade. It’s a wallaby. With the cars and the pets gone, many animals are moving back in. But tonight there’s a new, unwelcome intruder on the block. A penguin’s head’s been chopped off by a fox. A fox has been spotted lurking near the penguin colony. The park has a dedicated team just to eradicate foxes - the biggest single threat to penguins on the island, apart from humans. If it’s the right size and it’s mouldable, fox poo. Foxes were introduced by homesick English settlers a century ago. It’s the rangers’ job to get rid of them. There’s one over there. Hey? There’s a fox over there. Yeah, I see him. The winds are right behind so Yeah. The ranger makes a noise like an injured rabbit, to lure the fox within range. A big dummy, that one. Yeah. I’ll go over the road, eh? Yep. There’s a fox over there. He smelled us. He’s over there now, more to the left. WHISTLES Just hold it there. This feral fox has grown fat on penguins. They’ve killed, to stop more killing. About five. Really? It’s only a cub, but it’s pretty much adult weight. They’re doing very well here. Tonight, at last, it’s safe for Sammy and Tom to play among the surrounding burrows. Though big enough to be left alone each day, these dopey adolescents still have to grow street smart, which is a worry when they start wandering off towards the car park. Only a short walk, and a young penguin can get his first glimpse of a strange and unfamiliar species - international tourists. Half a million penguin fans come here every year. They seem harmless enough, but the boys stick close anyway. We might see some, I think, if we come over Maybe it’s time to shuffle off home. Sammy dares to look back and sees that his brother is gone. Young penguins will freeze stock still in the headlights at night. Just as well it’s a ranger who knows to wait. That’s enough adventure for one night. It’s taken two long weeks, but Foot, the penguin injured by fishing line, is now ready for release. He’s recovered his appetite and he has learnt to walk again, in his own way. That’s his last feed. Six fish, send him on his way. One last thing - a microchip - so they’ll know if he ever comes back. Check and make sure it’s in. Beautiful. He’s got sort of a third of a foot, so it’s not like he’s completely legless. Oh, what a gorgeous bird. You’re going, in lovely wild weather. The ocean, wait till you see the ocean. Oh, really? It’s huge. We like to do this in the morning so that he can get far enough off shore to make a decision whether to stay out there or to come in and re-establish his burrow tonight, with the other penguins. What a perfect day it is for it. So here’s good. Don’t want to get wet. OK sweetheart, go and be safe, all right? And avoid that fishing line. What’s out there? What’s out there? Go on, off you go. Bye-bye. Bye. I think he’s on his way. He probably won’t be seen again, unless another bad thing happens to him. Next, Sammy and Tom face a terrible crisis in their little lives. The colony is starving and penguin parents are forced to abandon their chicks in the quest for food. That chick’s a shocking weight, there’s no chance that it’s going to survive. And a satellite tracker tells the research team how far these brave little birds will travel to save their young. Left alone for so long, can both Sammy and Tom survive? E- mail subtitling@bbc. co. uk

EP3. Where Have All the Fish Gone?

There’s a very special island off the south coast of Australia, where thousands of penguins come to breed. And thousands of people come to watch. Unique to this corner of our planet, the smallest of all penguin species, the Little Penguin, is battling to survive in a human world. But a dedicated team of scientists has sworn to guard them from people, predators . . and this year, from the hottest summer since records began. As starving chicks struggle to hang on and their parents scour the oceans for a dwindling supply of fish, what will it take to protect these pocket-sized creatures? Just seven-weeks-old, Sammy and Tom face the greatest challenge in their little lives. With food so scarce, all around them, chicks are wasting away. For these animals, raising chicks and staying alive, it’s not easy. Parents must swim for days on end to find anything to eat, leaving chicks like Sammy hungry and alone on Penguin Island. Perched on an exposed clifftop, in the shadow of a condemned family home, is a shallow burrow. It’s where penguin partners Sheila and Bluey chose to start a family. When mum and dad first left the chicks on their own at just three weeks of age, they started exploring the neighbourhood and soon learnt what life was like as a celebrity. Now seven weeks old, Sammy and Tom are a staggering 20 times their birth weight. But they’re still not big enough to survive on their own. It’s eight o’clock, the hour when penguin parents come home after a hard day’s fishing. That’s if they’ve found enough food for the family. Sammy’s waiting up. It’s been two days since he’s seen his mum and he’s fluffed up and hopeful. There’s nothing for penguins to eat on land, so until he’s big enough to get out there himself, he’s totally reliant on his parents. Tom waits in the family burrow. He’s less than a day younger than Sammy, but he’s smaller and weaker. 80% of chicks don’t survive their first year. When fish are scarce, starvation is the colony’s number one killer. PENGUINS CHIRP Only those penguins that have dodged boats, predators and bad weather will return to their burrows tonight. There’s no guarantee that Sammy and Tom’s folks will be among them. PENGUIN SQUEAKS Sammy’s unique peeping call is recognisable only to his parents. But he has no way of knowing which of these adults is his mum or dad. Also waiting up are the eight-week-old tearaways next door, Butch and Bruiser. More aggressive than Sammy, they beg from every passing adult. PENGUINS CHIRP AND SQUEAK Sammy seems to have a little more self-respect. He wants his real mum. This female has had it with Butch and Bruiser. They’re not her chicks and she’s desperate to find her own. It could be good news for Sammy. If she’s not their mum, then maybe she’s his? There’s only one way to be sure. A penguin version of the rugby tackle. But it’s all for nothing. She doesn’t recognise him. Penguins stream past Sammy and Tom’s burrow, ignoring the peeping chicks. PENGUIN SQUEAKS The adult penguins all have their own chicks to feed in the scrub behind the house. A no-show from mum and dad means yet another day hungry and alone. It’s early December, and the heat has already set in. It’s going to be a tough summer for all the island’s animals. But time is running out for the chicks in the clifftop burrow. Sammy and Tom have only a few weeks to grow to a weight where they can survive at sea. Without regular food, they’ll never make it. Penguin ranger Elizabeth Lundahl-Hegedus lives here. She’s been keeping an eye on the penguins that nest in her garden. And with the heat picking up, she’s a bit worried about Sammy and Tom’s burrow. That’s the only natural penguin burrow, that’s actually right smack in the middle of the grass here. And it’s not a very successful one. Well, it’s a bit open. I think the roof has caved in because it’s so terribly dry that there’s nothing holding it together there. Sammy and Tom are just two of 26,000 Little Penguins who hide away along this rugged two mile coast of Phillip Island. But they are being watched - by a team of dedicated scientists close-by. We’re so environmentally conscious in this place that I can’t actually find a plastic bag. OK. Field researcher Leanne Renwick keeps track of micro-chipped penguins in special sites, to check the health of the whole colony. She soon realises something is wrong. This chick has quite obviously died and unfortunately its sibling is dead inside. There’s two on top of each other. There’s another one close by and I can actually see another two just right nearby, as well. Which seems to be a little too many, just right here in one area. There’s another dead chick in here as well. Leanne knows how tough life is for penguin chicks, but this is much worse than normal. Oh, this one’s going terrible. This one anyway is 470g. So it’s not looking good. Clearly, penguin parents are not coming home to feed their chicks, leaving them to die a slow death from starvation. It’s heartbreaking, but the scientist’s role is only to monitor the penguins. These are wild animals and it’s a completely wild population and wild situation, so, really as scientists and people working in this industry, you’re really not meant to interfere in that life and death and survival process. There are thousands of chicks around here at the moment, you know, just not making it through the breeding season. So, you just can’t rescue them all. Immature chicks are unable to rescue themselves. They can only wait and wait for mum and for dad to come back with food supplies. In this heat, Elizabeth checks in on Sammy and Tom one more time. But she’s about to make a grim discovery. Another night without food was just too much for poor little Tom. He must have collapsed while out desperately begging for something to eat. Sammy is now left to continue on his own. I don’t think that one’s going to survive either. It could do, if the parents come back tonight. But obviously the reason the other one died is that it hasn’t been fed, so it means that they’ve gone a long way away to fish and are not finding anything. If it’s lying around like that I tend to throw it into the bushes because little children will come past in the car and get upset. And lots of parents don’t want their children to know what actually goes on in nature, so Nature is cruel, or not even cruel, it’s just totally indifferent. Penguin parents don’t usually stay away this long. With chicks back on shore, they normally make short day trips - unless they can’t find fish nearby. Ranger John Evans is checking for telltale schools of fish, called bait balls. It’s a kind of penguin banquet. It’s all really to do with how close it’s feeding to shore, so those adult birds are always going to look after themselves. So if they’re too far away, and they still haven’t caught enough food, they’re going to stay out at sea. So that’s when those chicks cannot get fed perhaps one, two, three, four days. So it all depends on how close the schools of pelagic fish are to here, and how close those birds are catching them, will depend on that chick getting fed. Penguins with chicks on land will normally swim no more than about 12 miles to find food. But that’s still the equivalent of two marathons for us - given our comparative size - just to get lunch. And they travel pretty much non-stop, too. Occasionally taking a nap for a few minutes at a time as they float on the surface. But the longer they are out here, combing the sea for food, the more they’re exposed to danger. Their white bellies make them a little harder to spot by sharks peering up from below. And their dark blue overcoats give them the perfect camouflage from predators in the sky. But that doesn’t protect them from humans. There’s plenty at sea to stop a penguin making it home. Ranger John Evans patrols the colony. He knows it’s no easier for penguins stuck on land. He’s not sure Sammy is going to make it. It’s a reasonable weight. What do they say? Life’s exhausting, you know? I mean, we probably find it easy. We’re about the only ones that do find it easy at times, but for these animals, raising chicks and staying alive, it’s not easy. The clock is ticking. Sammy’s parents have got a day or two at most, if they are to save their sole surviving chick. Down at the Penguin Parade, the tourists who’ve come to see the cute Little Penguins have little idea of the life and death struggle going on, up in the hills all around them. The audience is well fed, but the performers are hungry and their numbers are down. Just around the coast, far from the glitz and the glamour of the big show, other penguins swim ashore unnoticed. Sammy is out of his burrow on his nightly vigil. Underfed chicks often seek company and he’s teamed up with neighbours Bruiser and Butch. THEY ALL START CHIRPING Sammy’s a lot smaller than the others. He’s wasting away. He begs from his friends - a sign that he is desperately hungry. Flora, that’s Butch and Bruiser’s mum, has made it back this evening. She’s clearly found a good food supply not far from shore. But still no sign of Sammy’s mum or dad. Tonight, Sammy rushes to join the scrum. Bruiser gets the first mouthful of regurgitated squid. THEY CHIRP FRANTICALLY Just one little scrap would be enough to keep Sammy going for another night. But Flora will only feed her own chicks. As the weather worsens, Flora’s kids are still pestering her for more grub. They can guzzle up to 320g in a single night. Maybe when their dad, Frank, gets home he can dish up seconds. After three nights at sea, Frank is on the last leg home. Penguins have an acute visual memory to guide them back, but it’s a bit of an obstacle course round the back of the visitors’ centre. There’s a great shortcut right across the car park. Some bright sparks have even tried to nest here! It’s a major headache for the rangers and for the penguins. Another few hundred yards and Frank will be home. Dad, the delivery man, is back and he dishes out dessert. After feeding Butch and Bruiser, Frank greets Flora fondly. Some penguins mate for life and Frank and Flora have now been together for four years. Poor Sammy can only watch and wonder where his mum and dad are now. So, all the transmitters are on, so at least that’s The scientists want to work out exactly why penguin parents are leaving their chicks starving on land for so long. The best way to find out - satellite tracking devices. If they can plant one on an adult before it heads off to sea, it could lead them to the penguins’ current hunting grounds. It’s late afternoon and Frank is still snoozing after that long trek through the car park. You really need to wear proper protection when waking up a penguin with their razor-sharp beak. Frank will be one of eight penguins to have a tracker snugly fixed to his back with industrial strength sticky tape. Yeah. Have you got its head from behind? Yep, that’s it. Back in the burrow, Flora comforts Frank. CHIRPING AND SQUEAKING It’s a greeting call. Just, “Hi, honey. “It’s you again. That’s good. “ At 4am, the penguin parents assemble for another perilous voyage, and they head down to the beach before it gets light. The morning rush has begun. Jittery about swooping gulls, they like to get down to the beach and into the water before sun-up. Frank’s late for today’s marathon food hunt. Maybe it’s that tracker on his back. So as not to put him off any more, we’ve switched to night vision. Penguins are wary on land and anything can scare them - even a tiny bush mouse. Next, Flora emerges to farewell her mate. Penguins fish alone and this couple may not see each other for several days. Frank heads off with £2,000 worth of electronics stuck to his back. He has no idea he’s transmitting a signal halfway round the world. So, there were eight trackers? Yeah, eight. The scientists will follow the signal from Frank’s tiny transmitter via a satellite station in France. This one here, at 9 o’clock, was 10km. After just a few hours, Frank is already far out to sea. But then he just keeps going, way beyond the usual ten-mile range. Soon they are 50 miles from their burrows, crossing some of the busiest shipping lanes in Australia. It’s unusual for penguins to come this far in summer. Close to the city of Melbourne, an incredible 75 miles from home. They’ve found a nutrient-filled river that drains into the bay. Micro-organisms blooming here have produced the penguin Holy Grail - a massive school of bait fish. It’s a slap-up meal for penguins desperate to feed their chicks. These tiny battlers now must make the long journey home with the day’s shopping. Two days later and nothing stops the nightly arrival of nature tourists. But will more penguins be home tonight? Numbers are definitely up. It looks like they’ve made it safely back from their distant hunting ground. With starving chicks waiting, there’s no time to dawdle for the adoring fans. For the tourists, the long uphill waddle is entertainment. For the penguins, it’s a race for survival. Meanwhile, up on the cliff, despite his crippling hunger, Sammy is giving it one last go. Suddenly, there’s a familiar figure. But he has made mistakes before. No need for a rugby tackle this time. His mum, Sheila, recognises her only surviving chick and feeds him dinner. Sammy now has a fighting chance. Later that night, the signal from the satellite station in France says that another Little Penguin has made it home to the island. The scientists head off to relieve Frank of his tracking device. Frank clambers 100 yards up the cliff after four days at sea. Flora has made it home too and Frank rushes to greet her. But the little fisherman can’t be that exhausted as one thing soon leads to another for this devoted couple. I wonder what they’ll be making of that signal in France! You’d think they’d give him ten minutes with the missus before coming to collect their blessed gadget! Got him! Fantastic. This is the penguin with the transmitter. It feels like it’s an OK weight but it’s certainly not huge. So it’s sort of seeming like, even though they’re going a long way to get food at the moment, that they’re still not managing to find a huge amount out there. Frank has clocked up a round trip of 150 miles in four days. And that’s with the tracker attached to his back. He scurries off to feed the kids before anything else gets stuck to his body! But what about little Sammy? Two days after he nearly starved to death, have his parents managed to feed him up? I think he’s probably got a bit of a chance that he might make it. I’ve seen penguins that are much skinnier and in much worse condition than he is. He’s much stronger now. Looks like he’s going to reach the next hurdle. Sammy’s close to what’s known as fledging - that’s the moment he can finally leave the burrow and venture out to sea to find his own food. That’s a short walk down the cliffs for us, but a giant leap into the unknown for Australia’s Little Penguin. Next - Penguin Island scorches in 104 degree heat, causing havoc among its animal population. Penguins are just not kitted out for weather like this. They’re just staggering around and falling over. Can Sammy reach the ocean in these conditions? Oh, mate. You’re just a bit hot. And what do you do with an overheated seabird? Nice spot for it, in with the fruit and veggies. If in doubt, stick ‘em in the fridge! E- mail subtitling@bbc. co. uk

EP4. A Heatware Hits the Colony

There’s a very special island off the south coast of Australia where thousands of penguins come to breed. And thousands of people come to watch. Unique to this corner of our planet, the smallest of all penguin species, the Little Penguin, is battling to survive in a human world. But a dedicated team of scientists has sworn to guard them from people, predators . . and, this year, from the hottest summer since records began. As starving chicks struggle to hang on and their parents scour the oceans for a dwindling supply of fish, what will it take to protect these pocket-sized creatures? This week, just when penguin chicks are ready to leave, a punishing heat wave hits the island. Oh, mate. The parents of a Little Penguin called Sammy have been missing for days, out at sea desperately hunting for food. If the heat doesn’t get him, starvation will. So can Sammy take the chance of searching for food himself off the shores of Penguin Island? Eight-week-old Sammy is one of the last penguin chicks remaining on land this season. Most now have the body weight and waterproof feathers they need to brave the sea and find food. THEY SQUEAK AND CHIRP Sammy waits, hesitating to join the stampede. He’s not the only one dragging his heels. Up at the Wagner’s beach house on top of the cliff, there are two other chicks slow to move out from their home. Stan and Sparky are also eight weeks old, but still getting occasional feeds from their parents. Why go to sea to hunt when dinner is home delivered? But Sammy hasn’t seen his parents for two days now. Without them his only food source lies out beyond the breakers. This hungry penguin watches the other chicks leave. It could be months before they return and years before they have their own penguin chicks. Life at sea will be tough for them. Most won’t survive their first year. Sammy decides to give it a while longer before he leaves home for good. He’s chosen a bad time to stay. The last few days have been unusually hot. ‘The southern states face at least another day of sweltering conditions ‘involving danger for the very young, the elderly and the infirm. ‘Victorians are being urged to stay indoors. ‘The state is bracing for its worst fire conditions ever ‘ A relentless heat is baking the island, pushing every animal to the limits of survival. 43 tomorrow, 35 Basically the forecast is it’s going to be hot. CROWS SQUAWK Penguins are particularly vulnerable to intense heat. On land, in a hot summer, their feathers that interlock at the tips to keep out cold now trap heat inside their bodies. PENGUIN CHIRPS In the worst case, their internal organs start to cook. With the heat wave set to continue, ranger John Evans goes looking for struggling penguins. The ones that are ashore during the day really, really struggle. So it can take, you know, as little as half an hour for them to die of heat stress. And it generally depends all on how much shade they have and how exposed they are to breeze. Any chicks now that are here, you don’t hold up much hope for. The secret for a penguin chick is to leave here really early during the breeding season and leave fat, OK? Being overweight is very handy for these birds. There’s two under the boardwalk here. Two chicks, just at a very loose guess, because their feathers look nice and blue. So what they want, is they want shade and they would love to be able to pick up breeze on those really hot days, OK? So here’s not a bad spot. They don’t yeah, they don’t like those hot days. Every month for over 40 years, the volunteer penguin study group has been monitoring penguins in one particular site behind the Parade beach. Oops, look out, that’s soft there. If you jump across here you’ll be all right. Chicks need a bodyweight approaching a kilo to survive at sea, and without it they’re stuck on the island. And the weight is 750. I’d like to see it nearer 1,000. And another dead one, very small dead one here. Above 80 degrees, penguins burn energy just to stay cool. But it’s already 95, and these underfed birds don’t have fat reserves to spare. There’s one live there and two dead. I don’t think I’ve seen so many that look to be heat stressed before, as this. It’s no longer hunger that’s the big killer. Now it’s the heat as well. There’s a penguin in here, I hate to tell you. The team is not supposed to intervene when wild penguin chicks die of natural, even if extreme, causes. This poor penguin is as good as dead, unable to crawl back under cover. But its suffering is too much for one young volunteer. If she can just get its body temperature down somehow, it may yet live. The seven-week-old chick is already recovering. But his bony little body means he won’t survive without immediate medical care. Will the busy hospital have room for one more overheated penguin chick? In conditions like these it’s first in, first served. Hello. Hey, mate. Even off-duty rangers have come in to help with the influx of heat-stricken animals. We have an overheated, very small penguin here. Just underweight at the moment? Well, overheated I think. Also very light, quite possibly underweight. This is the most penguins that we’ve ever had in the hospital. Yesterday, there were about 40. We lost a few last night. I think we’re between 35 and 40 penguins. So that’s a lot. And you can see there that the flippers are stretched out and its little legs are facing out backwards, which is not a good sign. First, emergency hydration, then straight to the cool room to get that body temperature down. A nice spot for it, in with the fruit and veggies. That’d be lucky, maybe 400g? Write a note on my desk, “Don’t forget the penguin in the cool room!” With so many penguin patients, they’ve used all the colours for identity tags. We have to actually record what medicines they have and how much they eat. So we use these little different coloured ribbons, and we’ve got that many birds at the moment that we’re running out of combinations. Jan’s the smartest here by a long way, so she’s going to have to decide which colours. Just choose one - and this sounds awful - choose one of the ones that died this morning. That’s what I said. It’s really morbid. After a couple of hours, the refrigerated chick is let out into the penguin ward. Ha, that’s one thoroughly chilled out penguin! Marg Healy now takes over his care. Squeak, squeak. You poor little chick. Come on. They’ve picked out a colour for the one they thought was a goner. Mauve. He’s now known simply as Mauve. 560 this chick is so thin. And this noise is a starving chick noise. But hopefully we can fix it. Penguins don’t drink for themselves, they get all their fluid from food, so if they’re not eating well they dehydrate very quickly. Mauve can’t possibly survive in the wild in his undernourished state. His only hope is if Marg can build up his body weight. That means force-feeding him five or six sardines twice a day. Um, I give him over a 50% chance now that’s he’s turned the corner a bit. There’s a pool for rehabilitating penguins. Mauve will get his first swim here, but not till he is a bit bigger and his feathers are waterproof. He’ll be put back in a nest box near where he was found. Hopefully then he’ll be strong enough to head out to sea. Still no break in the heat wave. In fact, it just keeps getting hotter. By 2:35pm the temperature in Melbourne, only 43 miles away as the crow flies, hits 115. 5 degrees Fahrenheit. At that moment there is nowhere hotter on the planet. Bushfires are raging across the state of Victoria. The day will later be known as Black Saturday, when 173 human and thousands of animal lives were lost. Unfortunately for Sammy, his burrow is more exposed than most. Now he’s started to hyperventilate, the last stage before a penguin collapses. If he can only make it to nightfall, when the temperature should drop a bit. The two chicks under the holiday house are much better off, with good shelter from the sun. They spend the day tucked well away under the Wagners’ downstairs laundry. In the hospital, it’s not just penguins struggling but native animals you’d expect to be able to cope with extreme heat. Marg tries to hydrate a baby possum. He’s fallen from his mother’s pouch and was found staggering on the beach. No, you’re not going to help are you, sweetheart? I know, I know, it’s not fun. Come on, sweetheart, work with me. That’s right. That’s right. This is the hottest that we’ve ever had and they literally are dropping out of the trees, they literally are, and that poor little creature was down in the salt water trying to drink. So it’s too hot, it’s unusually hot, and it is a worry. So no, they don’t know how to deal, I don’t think, with this amount of continual heat. I think they can do a day or two, but give them a third day and it’s all a little bit much. It’s all a bit much. Oh. Just another one. I think it’s nearly we’re close to 40 penguins in here now, then. 500g. So he’s about half what he should be, probably. He’s not too bad, so he should be OK, with a bit of luck. In two hours, the penguin parade opens for tourists. But right now, the heat seems to have brought deathly quiet. Just when they thought they’d made it to the end of this demanding day, someone reports another penguin casualty. A full grown adult this time. In a desperate attempt to reach water he went the wrong way and ended up outside the tourist centre. At 5pm on a Saturday it’s going to be hard to find anyone to help. There’s a penguin out the back that’s not looking very well. Look at that. He can’t even get up and walk. Oh, God. It’s just a bit hot. That’s not our chick, is it? No, it’s an adult. Oh, mate. It’s too far to take him back down to the sea. They do their best to cool him in the staffroom till a senior ranger takes more drastic action. No, mate, he’s nearly dead. Carol, can you grab me the key, please. This bird’s about to die. Ranger Rebecca Overy knows what this penguin needs most is a drink, which means getting the hydration equipment from the hospital, now closed for the night. This is like a sports drink for animals. No. No, we lost him. But it’s too late. Rebecca can’t save him. Once they’ve ventured out of their burrows in searing heat like this, nine out of ten won’t make it. An evening sea breeze brings a welcome cool to Phillip Island. The first busload of tourists has arrived for the evening’s penguin parade. They drive right past Sammy’s burrow. Amazingly, he is still alive. Sammy has survived the hottest day in living memory. But if his parents don’t come to feed him soon he’ll have to risk going to sea and finding food himself. A week later, the heat wave has passed and Mauve is now 1. 3kg. Marg has fattened him up enough to survive in the wild and have his first swim. As soon as they get their head under they suddenly go, “Oh, my life is complete. “ They often just circle the pool for hours on end. I mean, it must be like from, I don’t know, riding a pushbike to riding a Grand Prix motorbike, in some ways. He’s a really good weight and he knows how to swim and so I’m thinking, yeah, he’ll work it all out. It’s his last day of accommodation with breakfast included. In a few moments he’ll be released near where he was found. PENGUIN CHIRPS AND SQUEAKS Mauve swaps his ribbon for a microchip to track his movements Beautiful. . . and gets a new name. There you go. It’s very boring. It’s 6C9729D. He’s probably absolutely terrified, a kind of, “Now what?” Nobody home? Perfect. OK, sweetie, you’re a wild penguin again. Now, the ocean’s that way, OK? This is where you’re living now and hopefully you’ll come back to here, not the hospital, OK? Concentrate. Right, stay in there. In you go. With a bit of good sense, this time around he’ll stay out of the sun. At least, that’s the theory. It’s one little obstacle to stop coming out during the daytime. You probably could see it. It’s really hard, but I think it’s just over there. Meanwhile, Stan and Sparky wait for dark before emerging from their hideaway under the Wagners’ beach house. By the time the Wagner kids have had dinner and turned in for the night, the chicks downstairs are getting ready for their parents to bring home another slap-up feed. Stan’s flippers are now ten centimetres long and quite ready for swimming. He really should be off feeding himself by now, not sponging off Mum and Dad. Although the brothers were born within a day of each other, Sparky’s fluff shows he still has some growing to do. So, if a parent does come home tonight, it’s important he gets some nutrition first. Sammy too, waits near his burrow in case of one last feed. But it’s a faint hope when his parents have been gone so long. A well-fed female is one of the first ashore at the parade beach. Could this be Sammy’s mum? Or Stan and Sparky’s? There’s no time for a curtain call tonight. This mum joins the rush-hour traffic to head straight to her chicks. It’s 600 yards from here to the burrows, where the hungry kids are waiting. With fish in her stomach for some lucky chick, she shuffles through the car park, giving the coaches a wide berth. Patience doesn’t come easily to young Sparky and Stan. CHIRPING The food isn’t even here yet, and the two brothers are already winding each other up. Nearly home, the returning mum turns onto the coast road. Just got to wait for the traffic leaving the parade. Sparky notices something at the bottom of the garden. It’s Mum! The ensuing food fights are a nightly show for Karen Wagner. Here come the chicks out of the burrow. Their mum beat the rush. Sparky gets in first. Stan immediately tries to elbow him out of the way. Not sure which is worse - penguins mating or penguins feeding. Shut up! As a parent, I don’t know if I’d spend all day just to get their food to come back and have them harass me for the next 12 hours, when you well, maybe children do that. FRANTIC CHIRPING AND SQUEAKING Further along the cliffs, plenty of adults stream by. But no-one stops to feed Sammy. It seems his parents are never coming back. It’s crunch time for Sammy. In the early hours of the morning, he takes the most important step of his life. He heads down to the water. He follows other penguins in the pre-dawn stampede to the beach. With no-one to teach them to swim, chicks entering the water for the first time experiment with stroke techniques. It’s now or never for Sammy. He takes one last look at the colony where he spent his first eight action-packed weeks. In just a few moments he’ll start a whole new life in Australia’s Southern Ocean. It’s turning into a tough season, and there’s still a month of summer to go. Next on Penguin Island, new technology shows us just what penguins get up to out at sea. Perennial bachelor Rocky finally finds a mate, but should he be starting a family when late season chicks rarely survive? And Marg gets her most difficult patient yet. He’s very lively, this guy. He’s just attacking everything. E- mail subtitling@bbc. co. uk

EP5. Rocky Finds Love at Last

There’s a very special island off the south coast of Australia, where thousands of penguins come to breed. And thousands of people come to watch. Unique to this corner of our planet, the smallest of all penguin species, the Little Penguin, is battling to survive in a human world. But a dedicated team of scientists has sworn to guard them from people, predators . . and this year, from the hottest summer since records began. As starving chicks struggle to hang on, and their parents scour the oceans for a dwindling supply of fish, what will it take to protect these pocket-sized creatures? This week, a late-born penguin chick must grow up quickly or starve. A new device reveals the penguins’ amazing underwater life. And a problem patient in the hospital on Penguin Island. He’s very lively, this guy. He’s just attacking everything. A short waddle up from the parade beach is a popular hangout known as the Penguin Cafe. For the entire summer breeding season, this amorous little penguin, Rocky, has been trying to find himself a mate . . but somehow every female seems to pass him by. Just when he thinks he’s in luck, some bigger bloke muscles in. For Rocky, it’s been a long summer without rain. Now Jess, a two-year-old female, has caught his eye, and he seems to have caught hers. For the first time in his young life, it looks like Rocky is going to be a dad. Only problem, it’s very late in the season to be starting a new family. A month later and the couple waits for two precious eggs to hatch. The neighbourhood around them has grown quiet. The neighbourhood around them has grown quiet. Most penguin chicks have grown up and gone to sea, or will soon be leaving, Most penguin chicks have grown up and gone to sea, or will soon be leaving, like Spike’s family next door. Spike’s kids are almost big enough to move out. But he still insists on early bedtime. He and his missus will soon be empty-nesters, while Rocky’s chicks haven’t even hatched yet. Just before dawn, the bugle call goes out. Time for any remaining adults to depart for the day’s fishing trip. It’s safest to travel in groups, so everyone leaves together. Today it’s Rocky’s turn to go and feed up, while Jess minds the eggs. Both parents need to eat heaps if they’re going to support two new chicks. Little Penguins always go to sea before sunrise. In daylight, birds of prey maintain a kill zone right near the shoreline. Rocky makes it to the sea before dawn. Back at the Penguin Cafe, most nestboxes are empty during the day. Just Spike’s chubby chicks, home alone in box 133 . . and Jess, keeping the eggs warm in box 65. Most penguins lay just one clutch of two eggs each year, but this is Jess’ second attempt. Her first chicks died, so she’s trying again with a new partner. It’s a high-risk strategy. There’s very little time to raise the chicks before the annual moult. That’s the time at the end of each summer when all penguins must stop raising chicks and grow new feathers. Meanwhile, Rocky’s out at sea, feeding up for his impending fatherhood. He’s not the only one looking for food today. Warm currents have brought schools of fish to the surface. Australian fur seals cash in while the going’s good. So too do these hungry Australasian gannets. Together they herd bait fish from above the sea surface, then torpedo in at high speed to grab them. Underwater for a few seconds only, they gobble their prey down whole, before they resurface. A powerful plunge diver, it’s no bird to mess with. So this one’s being brought into the hospital with plenty of homemade gannet-proofing. He’s very lively, this guy. Believe it or not, this is only a juvenile gannet, found abandoned and hungry on a nearby beach. The penguin patients are not so sure about sharing their pool with a big gawky bird. This grumpy gannet can’t fly yet. He’ll starve without a mum to feed him. But wildlife carer, Marg Healy, can’t help him while he’s being all aggro. He’s very freaky, isn’t he? The most aggressive one I’ve had so far. Yeah, yeah. I think we should get out of here. He’s looking absolutely freaked. He’s just attacking everything. Tonight we’ll let him settle, not hassle him at all and then harass him tomorrow to feed him and try and teach him to take fish from my hand. Some gannets are nice, some gannets are killers, and unfortunately this one sounds like he’d like to kill us. Early evening at the tourist centre . . and there’s an exciting development at the Penguin Cafe. After 35 long days of incubation, Jess’s first chick hatched this afternoon. The fluff ball is just hours old. Right now, he’s totally blind and helpless. Jess’s second egg is also showing signs of life. Penguin hatchlings have a tiny bump on their beaks called an egg tooth, to help them cut their way out. Once free, their special opening tool disappears for good. For Jess, the journey to parenthood has been plagued by discomfort. Stuck in her nestbox, minding eggs, she can’t go to sea and wash off parasites, like ticks. Nor can she fish for her young. Rocky must bring home food supplies tonight, otherwise this little thing won’t last the week. Back at the hospital, it’s time for breakfast for that juvenile gannet . . and Ranger Jarvis is going to get a lesson in feeding large sea birds. God, you’re quick! First, when holding a gannet between your legs, always keep the beak pointing away from you. Second, use welding gloves if available. Don’t relax. He knows. Only problem, this young bird is used to a breakfast pre-digested by his mother, not these defrosted sardines. Oh, just a bit crooked. I just want him to open his mouth just a bit more. God, you’re a silly gannet! OK, eat it. The gannet just doesn’t get it. He’s not leaving hospital till he’s put on some weight. What happens if you relax your grip? Oh! Come on, sweetheart. Swallow it! That’s it, good boy! I do think we’re getting somewhere. That’s eight, and we’re going for ten if possible. 20 would be good. 20 would be getting weight on, ten will keep him alive. Marg’s next trick, a home-made gannet launching device for getting him into the water, so he can start behaving like a real sea bird. Keep going. Keep going. Keep going. Ha! But no time for technology today. Silly bird. You should have just walked up the ramp. He’s got no co-ordination. The gannet seems to be taking to the aquatic life, for the moment at least. Rocky is still not home. A newborn chick can last two days at most without food. 24 hours have already passed, and Jess’s chick is very hungry. And now, her other chick has nearly hatched, a second beak for her to feed. Hatchlings cut a line around the widest part of the egg. It’s like opening a can of beans to make the largest escape hatch. Jess does her best to help it into the world. Her second chick has finally hatched, but its battle for life has only just begun. The first of the day’s fishing party are returning to the cafe. Will Rocky be among them? The big chicks at box 133 are getting ready for dinner. Spike is one of the first dads home. He gives his boys the meal they’ve been hanging out for. But the news is less good for the tiny newborns next door. Three hours later, and their father still isn’t home. There’ll be no dinner tonight. Why has Rocky been out at sea for so long? The Phillip Island scientists want to find out, and they’ve got a collection of hi tech tracking devices to help them. They’ve discovered that penguins swim an average of about 30 miles a day in search of fish, but won’t return home till their bellies are full. Rocky must be having trouble finding food. Zoologist Andre Chiaradia attaches a tiny computerised logging device to an unsuspecting penguin. So this tiny little computer, it’s very sophisticated, with lots of sensors inside, gives a lot of information, what the birds are doing at sea. So, how often they dive, how deep they dive, and how often they find food. Data uploaded from these tiny gadgets shows that penguins like Rocky dive up to 70 metres on a single lungful of air, as many as 1,300 times a day. Humans would need special equipment to survive such relentless pressure change. Penguins adjust their dive depth according to the temperature of the water, because that determines the type of food available - anchovies, squid, or baby barracuda. The little penguin even has an in-built desalination plant, to digest the salt water in whatever it eats. Once loaded up with food, they form up in rafts, ready to come ashore when it’s dark. Visual clues guide them home, like underwater contours, and even the lighting towers on the parade beach. First to set foot ashore, after three days away, is none other than Rocky. And there’s a welcoming committee waiting for him, but he’s still got a 600 yard trek to get home to his family. Rocky is struggling to keep up. His belly is fit to burst. He can barely squeeze through the fence, the shortcut to his nestbox. He finds Jess waiting outside their home. But sadly, Rocky is too late for their first chick. Three days without food was just too much. Rocky and Jess must now put all their effort, and their fish, into keeping the second infant alive Her chances of survival have just increased dramatically with the death of her brother. It’s unusual for penguins, but Rocky and Jess appear to be comforting each other after their loss. Three weeks fly by on Phillip Island. It’s now early March. Well-fed penguins, once admitted to hospital, starving or heat-stressed, now laze in the pool after a long lunch. The place is beginning to look like a Club Med. As for that adolescent gannet, he’s getting room service breakfast every day, and, at last, he’s putting on weight. He’s still not very nice to his personal dietician though! You have to go in the pool. Now, time for some hydrotherapy. Food that dries on feathers spoils waterproofing, so Marg’s patient gets a shower in the penguin plunge pool. Marg’s hosing also forces him to limber up his wings, and prepare for flight. Now three weeks old, Tilda, that’s Rocky and Jess’s sole surviving chick, is big enough to be left home alone. Both parents out fishing means it’s double helpings tonight . . but she’s running out of summer. Her parents will soon start moulting, then they won’t be able to feed Tilda at all. Next door, box 133 is now empty. Spike’s chicks have already grown up and gone to sea. PENGUIN CALLS The following morning, there’s a right old racket at the Penguin Cafe. It’s Spike! Instead of spending the day at sea, or sleeping in his box, he’s camping out in the open behind a tree. Ranger Beau Farnley has been called in to see what all the kerfuffle is about. We’ve just got a penguin here that’s been acting a bit strange, coming out all day. We’ll just grab him, have a quick look, and see if he’s OK. PENGUIN CALLS ANGRILY But this fella is in no mood to be examined. I don’t think there’s anything too wrong with him. He seems pretty good. Yeah, he’s pretty pretty vigorous! He’s had a good nip at me, and he’s trying to get away, so All right, all right. OK, I’ll let you go. All right, I might just put him back, I think. The feathers on the ground give the game away. Spike has started moulting, and he couldn’t have chosen a more uncomfortable place to do it. Confined on land, unable to swim or feed, penguins stay tucked out of sight during early autumn. It’s a time when, frankly, they’re not looking their best. I guess some that don’t have a good burrow to moult in, they’ll get under a tree for three weeks, and try and deal with having to shed all your feathers, and I guess it’d be like losing all your hair once a year, then having to regrow it. Nothing wrong with Spike. He just needs some space right now. Adults returning from the sea are visibly bigger. They’re piling on the fat reserves before they’re stuck on land growing their new winter wardrobe. The moment Tilda hears movement outside the nestbox, she starts her high-pitched squeaking. PENGUIN SQUEAKS Rocky recognises his chick’s unique call. She’s feeding well, and has reached 300 grams, but there’s a rush on to fatten her up fast. Jess has also had a successful day out fishing. PENGUIN CALLS She calls out to let them know she’s on her way with seconds. Rocky leaves Tilda to her mum. Rocky’s beginning to scratch more than usual. He too is about to undergo an unstoppable transformation. Normally, he can recondition his feathers with a liquid wax secreted from a preen gland near his tail. But this is different. His old feathers will soon start to fall out, and then he’ll be housebound. Time’s running out for Jess too. When her hormones tell her it’s time to shed feathers, they’ll also tell her to stop feeding her own chick. For little Tilda, one thing is certain. If her parents abandon her now, she has no hope of surviving. After weeks of high-protein diet, and the full spa treatment, the gannet is now a robust three kilos, and more than ready to learn to fish for himself. He’s been absolutely insanely chasing the penguins around the pool every feed. He’s actually being a bit mean cos the chicks don’t know to get away from him, so he’s pecking them, which isn’t a nice thing. Admittedly, very gently pecking. He’s not breaking skin, which he would with me. So he’s just playing, but he’s sort of fractious and energetic. It’s time to let the gannet go. Look, he’s a really good weight, he’s been doing all the right things water-wise, and there’s just no point in keeping a healthy gannet. Sorry, darling. You’re a bit over me, aren’t you? Come on. Oh, don’t do that. There’s a boy! One final indignity, a trip to the beach in a plastic box that smells of penguins! Marg tries to make it as quick and painless as she can. Four months old, it’s this young gannet’s first chance to fly. Don’t go that way. Oh, that was a bit silly. I wanted him to go out in the ocean, so he could actually fly off the water, rather than have to walk. What are you doing? You go back that way. Go on. It’s not looking good. Will Marg’s pre-flight training pay off? Go on. Off you go. At last, he works out what those big wings are for. Then, there’s no going back. Bye. Next week, in the final episode, work begins to remove all remaining houses from the colony. No more holidays among the penguins, and after the toughest ever season on the island, little Tilda must choose. Wait for her parents to return, or brave it alone out in the great Southern Ocean? E- mail subtitling@bbc. co. uk

EP6. Summer Ends on Penguin Island

There’s a very special island off the south coast of Australia, where thousands of penguins come to breed. And thousands of people come to watch. Unique to this corner of our planet, the smallest of all penguin species, the Little Penguin, is battling to survive in a human world. But a dedicated team of scientists has sworn to guard them from people, predators and this year, from the hottest summer since records began. As starving chicks struggle to hang on and their parents scour the oceans for a dwindling supply of fish, what will it take to protect these pocket-sized creatures? The punishing summer season is coming to an end. The last beach houses are going - there’ll be no more holidays among the penguins. And when an oil slick threatens the colony a woolly jumper might just be the answer. Meanwhile one last chick must finally choose - wait for her parents to return, or brave it alone in the Southern Ocean? Penguin fans who flock to Phillip Island usually have to wait until the nightly parade to see the stars of the show. But not now the annual moult is in full swing. It’s the one time of year when you can easily spot penguins on land, as they sit out the day growing new waterproof feathers. Just behind the tourist centre all alone in her nest box is Tilda, the single surviving chick of penguin parents Rocky and Jess. She’s now six weeks old. She needs a good couple of weeks of fattening up before she can head out to sea. But Tilda’s mum has gone off somewhere, maybe to moult, leaving Tilda all alone. She only needs to look around. The bad hair-dos are a tell-tale sign. These penguins can’t swim and they can’t feed. All they can do is mope around on shore, weakened and plagued by parasites. There’s a lot to complain about! Above the racket, Tilda hears a comforting sound penguin footsteps heading her way. But it’s not her mum It’s her father Rocky! He’s instantly drawn to Tilda’s squeaking call and dinner is served up. With Tilda’s mother gone AWOL, Rocky is now the sole provider. It’s hard work. Tilda is now almost as big as he is. It’s only the dedication of her dad that’s keeping her alive, but once Rocky starts losing his feathers, it’s game over. He won’t be feeding Tilda any more. But for now he bundles her out of harm’s way and heads off with the early morning fishing squad. He’s eating and fishing for two. Island zoologists, like Andre Chiaradia, know from bitter experience that chicks born late in the season rarely survive. Andre doesn’t hold out much hope for little Tilda. The chicks in this area, they live in such an unpredictable environment. It’s like gambling. So they can survive but their chances are really low. While Tilda’s fate hangs in the balance, there’s no future for humans living here. For years both penguins and people inhabited this peninsula. Now the government’s bought up all the houses in the penguin colony and is literally carting them away. It’s every penguin scientists’ dream - a people-free penguin park. Within a few years, this area we’re standing in, right through for about one or two kilometres that way will be all penguin habitat. There’ll be no signs of human habitation. The power poles will be gone, the buildings will be gone. It will look pretty much like we’ve never been here. Next house due for demolition, with the best view and location, belongs to ranger Elizabeth Lundahl Hegedus. She’s lived and worked here for 35 years but now it’s time to bid her penguin neighbours farewell. I am going to miss them, yes. I certainly am. We have to leave. We’ve got to go somewhere else. It’s stressful, isn’t it? And it’s not just people getting kicked out. Field researcher Leanne Renwick, is evicting any penguin squatters who might be injured by the demolition crews. When they’re moulting, they’re happy to just sit anywhere - under trees, but they could be under the plastic or between tyres or pretty much anywhere. I’m not 100% sure what I can see but I think it’s a penguin. Can I give you that one? I think I’ve got a good hold on this one. These boxes, I’ve actually just brought in because we’ve been finding so many penguins on the site and under the house. Any bewildered little stragglers they find are given temporary digs somewhere safer. It’s off to the island hospital for this female with infected eyes. Yet another patient for head carer, Marg Healy. Stuck on land, growing new feathers, penguins can’t flush their eyes out in the saltwater sea. Well, a completely blind penguin dies or even a penguin with one eye dies because they can’t fish, but one that’s fixable, we fix. Well, she’s in mid-moult and basically she’s just sitting around doing nothing much except pushing these new feathers out of the same follicle that the old feathers were in. So they have this yearly risky time of getting fat enough, changing all their feathers and getting back into the water before they’re too thin to feed themselves. It is one of their really stressful, hard times. There you go. Marg’s penguin care service is there to help 24/7. But it wasn’t always like this. In the days before the wildlife hospital, an injured penguin’s only chance was to be rescued by a family like this one who’d cuddle and fuss the little fella back to health before setting him free again. These days, scientists have strict rules for studying penguins. They are dealing with wild animals, and if they handle them too much they stop being a wild study sample. So the scientists test a new device to weigh the birds without any human contact. It’s an automatic penguin weighbridge. Originally built for bigger Antarctic seabirds, they’ve come up with a scaled-down version and stuck it right on the beach in the path of the nightly Penguin Parade. Andre shows us how it works. OK, this is my penguin. I use this to calibrate my weighbridge. So the penguins, they come out of the water. They cross the beach and they get this little path from the ocean, they come up here, climb down these rocks, and they cross the weighbridge Blam blam blam. And they go to the colony. Tonight, for the first time, night vision cameras will show exactly what happens. The punters pour in, and soon, so will the penguins. The park has to do all it can to protect wild penguins from fans who, given half the chance, would love them to death. Tourists may not like it, but all photography is banned. Camera flash wreaks havoc with the penguins’ night vision. You can still get a shot of a penguin and be in the picture yourself, thanks to digital magic. Good. The penguins are here in the photo so count to three and then you can either point if you like, you can smile, you can “Ahh!” Ready? One, two, three. Good, come and see. Meanwhile, in the real penguin world, Tilda is suffering. She’s hungry, really hungry, and without fish, she’s also dehydrating. Penguins can’t drink groundwater, unlike this ring-tailed possum who lives in the tree above. Tilda’s stuck waiting for her only food supply - her parents - while the possum has the run of the island. Hopefully for Tilda, she hasn’t been forgotten. The first adult penguins are hurtling back onto the parade beach. But neither the fans nor the penguins have any clue about the weighbridge lying hidden in the sand dunes. It turns out that penguins will stick to their established route back to their burrows, even if it means waddling across an unfamiliar hunk of metal. The machine doesn’t just weigh the penguins, it can identify them too, thanks to microchips inserted under their skin. And there’s good news for Tilda. Right in the middle of the group is Jess, her mum. Topping out at 1. 6 kilos, she’s clearly carrying a bellyful of fish, plenty for little Tilda. Tilda’s unaware her mum’s on her way and gets on with all that important preening. She must rid herself of fluffy down if she’s ever to make it to the sea. Then she hears the sound of a penguin outside. Mum’s back! But Tilda is in for a shock. After two weeks away Jess seems surprised to find her in the nestbox. And as chicks have difficulty in distinguishing one adult from another, Tilda is not even sure that this IS her mum. She tries her unique begging call. But Jess ignores her daughter’s desperate pleas. It’s a cruel twist of nature. Jess’s moulting hormones have kicked in and they’ve switched off all her maternal instincts. She will no longer feed her own flesh and blood. The only one who can save Tilda now is her dad, Rocky. It’s not just starvation that endangers animal life on the island. It’s annoying oil is all I can say. We thought we got it off but I’ve just checked it and it’s still slimy. Yeah, it’s a big female. Yeah, she’s pretty angry. Alrighty. It’s very hard to wash a black swan by yourself. This time the threat is man-made. Marg’s taken in a swan coated in crude oil. And now there’s a penguin that’s nearly drowned in the same poisonous sludge. Somewhere out at sea a tanker must have sprung a leak, and this little chap has surfaced in the middle of an oil slick. Penguins can’t fly out of it or over it, so they swim straight through it, and they tend to have it sort of as a pattern on their chest. And they will ingest the oil when they’re preening because they use their beaks to pull the oil off their feathers. And if it gets into their system it’s very toxic and will kill them. We’ve got a really, really good detergent that covers a wide range of crude oils. Sometimes if it’s very tarry it can be a little bit like bitumen on the road. And it’s been setting on the bird for a long time. To stop them eating oil off the feathers, a secret weapon - a woolly penguin polo-neck. The jumpers work by being all over their body, which tends to be where the oil is, and the penguin, when it tries to actually preen the oil, they can’t get at it because the jumper’s covering the oil patches. We did a prototype and tested it out on a penguin and now people all over the world knit these and we use hundreds of them in oil spills. Somehow it went worldwide and now we’ve got about 5,000 in storage and we still get about 50 a week. But the jumpers don’t come in extra-extra large. The only way to stop a black swan ingesting oil off its own feathers is to scrub him clean. And that’s a job for at least two. But it’s like something that comes out of your car, basically. It’s very slimy and Thick. There you go. Good girl. MOBILE PHONE RINGS I’m in the middle of washing an oiled swan, so can you ring in about half an hour? Another day has passed since little Tilda was rejected by her own mother. She hasn’t eaten in three days and now there’s no sign of her father, Rocky, either. Tilda is seriously hungry. And so is a passing blue-tongued lizard. Tilda’s too young to know that blue tongues go for abandoned eggs, not penguin chicks. And she cries out for her dad. But Rocky’s not listening. Even though he’s just twenty yards away squatting in a rainwater drain. Rocky looked after Tilda single-handedly for a whole week. But now he too has started to moult and, instinctively, he’s abandoned her. Tilda’s been left home alone and her mum and dad are never coming back. She must swim and fish or stay and die. The lucky families with houses on the island have watched the life-and-death struggle of the Little Penguins for years. Oh, look there’s a penguin. There. A penguin. Not any more. It’s checkout time. Everyone to be gone by the end of the day. Is that it? Yeah! Thank you! 23 years of summer holidays among the penguins are over for the Wagner family. Just around the next headland, Elizabeth sets off for a new life in the suburbs, with humans, not penguins, for neighbours. It’s the first time anywhere that an entire housing estate has been cleared for a single animal species. It’s nearly sunrise. All over the colony, the feather duster look is out and glossy new waterproofs are in. Ravenous after their forced starvation, it’s time for these born-again birds to get down to the sea and find something to eat. And Tilda, the starving chick, has heard their call. But she holds back. She’s barely big enough or feathered enough to survive the ocean. She’s just not ready. Maybe one more day before she heads out to sea. Marg’s washed all the oil off the penguin caught in the slick. Let’s hope he doesn’t swim into another one. OK, have a good life, sweetheart, look after yourself. Be careful. Bye-bye. There you go. And as for the penguin with the 50-50 chance of blindness - 20-20 vision. That one’s still a little bit sore, but this one’s just perfect. They’re both looking really good. I don’t know if you can see that but they’re nice and clear, third eyelid’s moving across perfectly. So she’s lovely and pink in her mouth. That means she’s feeling much better today. So just a couple of fish. It’s very hard not to feed them their own feathers at this stage of life. This one not only gets a safe place to finish moulting, but regular meals included. There you go. I think she’s doing so well she can stay outside today. That’s one more penguin life saved. But what about little Tilda? Where is everyone? They must have already left for the day. For Tilda, it’s now or never. Somewhere out there is her future. But there’s no-one to show her the way. The other penguins are already on the beach. Anxious to reach the water before dawn, they’re not about to wait for a chick like Tilda. She hesitates for a moment, but she really has no choice. Her only hope now is to try and do what the others do. Her fluffy feathers betray her youth. If her waterproofing doesn’t work, she’ll drown. Too late, she’s off! So far so good. We won’t know if she makes it past sharks, gulls and tankers until she returns one day, to have her own chicks. With most penguins now gone to sea, Marg can finally take a break. I haven’t looked at the statistics but we’ve had more penguins long term than ever besides oil spills. So, yeah, it’s been a bloody hard season. And some of her patients have outstayed their welcome, like Jonathan - a perfectly healthy silver gull who walked in one day and never left! You’re noisy. Come on! Go and play with the real seagulls. Attaboy. “Seagull-walker” is not in Marg’s job description. You stay out there. Any remaining animals will be looked after by volunteers while she’s away. Last year, I took four weeks holidays and four weeks leave without pay. It’s been a very long season and four weeks just isn’t enough time to recover body and mind, I don’t think. You sleep! Bye, guys. It’s been one of the toughest years ever on Phillip Island. When hundreds of loyal penguin couples reunited to start new families. Their chicks thrived at first, before a blistering heatwave and famine devastated the colony. And the scientists discovered the birds were travelling further than ever to find food for their chicks. For some, it was all too much. No, we lost him. Others only just made it. Males had to fight beak to beak for females. But lifelong relationships were formed. And couples like Rocky and Jess are still together. There’ll be plenty of space for the next generation of Little Penguins thanks to the people who’ve given up their homes and their unforgettable holidays to turn this place into a dedicated animal habitat. For the first time in half a century, these remarkable seabirds will take back their island Penguin Island. 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