January 14, 2012-
National Geographic Explorers are excited to announce that they have spotted and photographed a rare white penguin earlier this week on an expedition in Antarctica.
Yahoo News reported that the rare white penguin emperor chick was spotted among the hundreds of regular black and white tuxedo penguins on the Antarctica Aitcho Islands.
The penguin was photographed by David Stephens, a naturalist on board the Lindblad Expeditions' National Geographic Explorer ship.
Stephan's described the bird as looking as "whitish, but not quite albino."
The Leucistic Penguin, who are also referred to as albinistic penguins, have a reduced level of pigmentation, due to the pigment in the birds eyes.
Stephan's also stated, "it is very rare to find a nearly all-white penguin,because the traditional penguins' black and white coloring serve as their crucial camouflage while diving and hunting for fish. The leucistic penguin still manage to breed normal,but are still a very rare breed of penguin to find, making the spottings few and far between for the bird observers."
Stephan's voyage is currently in the middle of a 14-day excursion to Antarctica.
Which do you prefer the traditional black and white tuxedo penguins or the rare-white bird?
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