March south to peer at penguins

So you've taken the — ahem! — plunge and waddled down to the movie theater to see "March of the Penguins." Now you're feeling a bit anthropomorphic and you're ready to zip off in high pursuit of these little black-tuxedoed birds to see them up close.

So where to go?

Before calling a travel agent, the first thing to know is that penguins are found only in the Southern Hemisphere. They are not in the Arctic or Alaska or even Greenland or Iceland or Siberia, all perfectly fine albeit cold places where you would normally think penguins would congregate. But the fact remains that none of these birds is north of the equator. Except in zoos, but let's not even go there.

Penguins are considered among the most adorable and sweetest of all bird species. While studying up on them is definitely in order before you traipse all over the world to find them, I've done some basic homework for you.

Penguins, of which there are 18 species, have been around for ages, with some fossils dating as far back as 50 million to 60 million years. They are likely much smaller than you imagine, too. The smallest, the little or fairy penguin, stands just 18 inches tall. Emperors, the largest species, measure to only about 4 feet tall.

The birds need cold water for reasons too technical to go into, so that's why they're found near oceans. They can withstand intense cold temperatures, in part because of the insulating layers of fat and in part because they have relatively large bodies in relation to their head, wings and feet, which results in darned good heat conservation.

They have webbed feet, which come in handy for swimming and diving. Although they're considered birds, they can't fly, but they can jump and leap and wobble and slide with the best of 'em. They're playful, too, sometimes soaring out of the water like dolphins.

Penguin rookeries often cover several miles of coastline, which can mean thousands of birds, and they are generally quite noisy. Their favorite meal is a seafood buffet of fish, squid, krill and crustaceans. Some male emperors may not eat for as long as 15 weeks during mating season, but when the chicks hatch, it's pig-out time, when they sometimes eat as much as 25 pounds of food a day. Penguins can actually drink all the seawater they like, because they have a special gland that removes the salt.