Seno Otway Penguin Colony
Chile's Southern Patagonia Magellanic Penguin colony
The Seno Otway Penguin Colony in Southern Chile is gaining popularity thanks to a slew of popular films on penguins.
The Seno Otway Colony is located 70km north of Punta Arenas, in Chile’s Southern Patagonia Region.
More than 5000 pairs of Magellanic penguins make this spot of shoreline on the Strait of Magellan their home. They live in small burrows in the ground where they raise their young. The penguins can be seen marching back and forth from their burrows and the sea where they search for food. The pairs raise two chicks per season.
A boardwalk and viewing platforms criss cross the reserve. The penguins walk and hoot just steps from you. They tend to wait until groups of people pass before moving at times, therefore, signs are placed at certain points that tourists should not stop for any reason as to not interfere with the penguins feeding their young.
The reserve was established in 1991 after a school director in Punta Arenas watched as visitors would picnic near the penguins and coax them out of their burrows with barbed wire. The colony had just 400 penguins at the time and has sharply grown since.
The Magellan Penguin (Spheniscus magellanicus) breeds throughout the coast of Southern Chile, Tierra del Fuego and north along the coast of Argentina and on the Falkland Islands. They aren’t as threatened as the Humboldt penguin; however, many of the breeding colonies are threatened. It stands 18 inches tall and weighs approximately 8 pounds. The penguins number around 2 million in South America.
The penguin has a black head and upper parts and has two white stripes beneath the neck. One stripe runs up behind the cheeks and above the eye. The other stripe runs adjacent to the white under parts with which they merge above the legs.
Many companies make the tour by bus every afternoon from Punta Arenas. En route you see fantastic Patagonia scenery in every direction and often encounter the ostrich like rhea, hares, and skunks. Admission to the reserve is just $4.
The Isla Magdalena Penguin Colony across the Strait is far more impressive with more than 50,000 penguins; however, it is only accessed by boat on full day tours which are often canceled due to rough seas.
Movies such as March of the Penguins and Happy Feet have spurred an increasing number of tourists to visit penguin colonies in Argentina and Chile.
