Kids' Field Trip Uncovers Entirely Unknown Species Of Extinct Giant Penguins
Photo of emperor penguins, which the discovered penguin is larger than by far. Image via Shutterstock.com
A field trip by the Hamilton Junior Naturalist Club to the Kawhia Harbor in Waikato, New Zealand, revealed an entirely new species of a giant penguin that lived up to 30 million years ago.
They’d gone there expecting to find small fossils of shellfish and other similar creatures, but something bigger and a lot more fascinating caught the group’s eyes on the day they were scheduled to head home.
About a month later, an excavation process was carried out to extract the large fossil from its place in the sandstones. Then, it was donated to the Waikato Museum, Te Whare Taonga o Waikato, where researchers from Massey University and Bruce Museum investigated the mysterious creature.
Although this discovery was made by the kids back in 2006, researchers hadn’t identified this new species until recently.
With their findings published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, the team of scientists have determined the penguin to belong to a species known as the Kairuku waewaeroa.
The latter word is Māori for “long legs,” according to The Guardian. It’s an apt description, as it bears similarities to the Kairuku giant penguins but only with much longer legs.
This places it at an estimated height of 4’6” when standing up, as compared to the 4’2” most emperor penguins stand at today. Its height most likely allowed it to swim faster and reach greater depths when diving, as reported in the study.
Dating back to a maximum of 34.6 million years ago, these penguins existed at a time when Waikato was mostly underwater, according to Daniel Thomas, a senior lecturer in zoology from Massey University and study co-author. This would explain its adaptations to improved swimming.
“It’s sort of surreal to know that a discovery we made as kids so many years ago is contributing to academia today. And it’s a new species even,” Steffan Safey, one of the kids in the club, tells The Guardian. He was 13 at the time of discovery.
This discovery will propel knowledge about giant penguins, as well as penguins as a whole. Although the existence of giant penguins has been known, we still don’t know why and how they evolved to become giant, and why giants don’t continue existing today.
A giant fossilised penguin discovered by Hamilton school children in 2006 has been revealed as a new species. It's believed the fossil is between 27.3-34.6 million years old.
— Massey University (@MasseyUni) September 17, 2021
Read more about the research and discovery: https://t.co/93wWbrByXe pic.twitter.com/9JRbNpQ3Uz
[via Newser, image via Shutterstock.com]
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