A great-great-great grandmother Humboldt pengiun in England\u2019s blustery eastern coast has brought a member of yet another generation into the world after she shacked up with a bird 20-plus years her junior.<\/p>\n
Windy surprised everyone at the zoo when during the last breeding season she paired with 4-year-old Nacho. A pairing doesn\u2019t guarantee that mating will occur.<\/p>\n
But despite the fact that Windy\u2019s first egg was laid before Y2K had been disproven, and Nacho had only recently reached adulthood, the two produced a healthy young chick.<\/p>\n
Windy has produced 23 offspring, but for Nacho it\u2019s the first time.<\/p>\n
Due to the success of her descendants through the European breeding program in 2023, she claimed the title of great-great-great grandmother to a chick hatched in Schwerin Zoo, Germany.<\/p>\n
Even more remarkable about this pairing is that Windy might be the oldest penguin parent in the world.<\/p>\n
Penguins\u2014including Humboldt penguins\u2014usually only live to around 30 years old in captivity. But Windy is proving to be as capable a mother as ever to her latest chick.<\/p>\n
\u201cWindy was paired up with male penguin, Jet, for a long time, and produced more than 20 chicks together,\u201d said Dan Trevelyan, Senior Bird Keeper at Newquay Zoo in Cornwall.<\/p>\n
\u201dWhen Windy lost her partner, we didn\u2019t necessarily expect her to pair up with another penguin, but Nacho started courting Windy last year, and the two have been devoted to each other ever since.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThey had a clutch of eggs last spring, but neither of them were successful, so we are really happy that the pair have had a healthy chick this breeding season.\u201d<\/p>\n