The Antipodes archipelago, south of New Zealand, is home to a little-known species: the crested penguin, described as a “mysterious endangered species” par The New York Times (NOW). “We know practically nothing about them”, says biologist Lloyd Davis.
The fate of these animals prompted the researcher and his colleagues to look into data collected more than twenty years ago. “This constitutes, still today, the most detailed information (by far) available on this species”, write the authors of the study published on October 12 in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS One.
Their work provides food for thought as to the strange functioning of parenthood in this bird. One aspect of this cousin of the penguin is particularly intriguing: “they lay an egg which they never hatch”, reports