Greens in a flap over penguins

By ANNE BESTON

Exporting surplus penguins to China from Auckland's popular marine zoo raises questions about their welfare, says Green MP Sue Kedgley.

Kelly Tarlton's Antarctic Encounter and Underwater World sent 17 gentoo penguins to Shengya Aquarium in the Chinese port city of Dalian last month, on top of 17 sent last year.

Kelly Tarlton's manager Andrew Baker would not say how much the Chinese paid for the penguins but said the exports were done under the supervision of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and he was confident the birds did not suffer.

"Our staff just wouldn't put the penguins in a high-risk situation," he said.

The company did not hide the fact it was exporting penguins.

"We don't go around telling people we send penguins overseas but it's not something we hide, either," he said.

The success of Kelly Tarlton's breeding programme meant the gentoos, with an ideal population at the aquarium of around 70, were running out of room.

"As long as we continue to breed to keep them as they would be in the wild, and they're breeding famously, then we are always going to over-populate our space," he said.

The 17 mostly juvenile birds were taken by refrigerated truck from Kelly Tarlton's in individual, specially modified pet crates with icepacks and loaded into the cargo hold of a plane which was temperature-controlled, he said.

After a transit stop in Japan, the birds took another two-hour flight to China.

But Ms Kedgley said she was concerned about New Zealand exporting animals to a country with a poor animal welfare record and questioned whether Kelly Tarlton's was exporting the birds simply to make a profit.

"The penguins must suffer being put into a refrigerated truck and flown in a box around the world," she said.

"I think we have to ask whether this is really necessary."

Gentoos are protected. There are thought to be more than 300,000 breeding pairs in the wild, mostly on the sub-Antarctic islands, the Antarctic Peninsula and the Falkland Islands.

Mr Baker said Kelly Tarlton's was thinking of setting up another penguin display elsewhere in New Zealand.