Gizmo is one of twenty-seven African Penguins at the Seneca Park Zoo. His home at the zoo was built to resemble the rocky coastal beaches of South Africa as African penguins live in colonies there, on the southern and southwestern coast. In nature, he would be swimming in the salty ocean, but here at the zoo, he has freshwater pools. When this exhibit opened back in 1997, there were just seven penguins. Since then, the zoo has seen more than 100 penguins hatched, most of which are sent to other zoos and aquariums.
Zookeepers Brandon Belke and Jessica Sapienza explain that every penguin at the zoo has a name and a uniquely colored beaded band on its flipper indicating who it is. The ten male penguins wear the bracelets on their left flipper and the seventeen females wear theirs on the right. But as soon as you start to spend time with these adorable flightless birds, you’ll notice they each have very different physical features and personalities.
Because of his big personality, ten-year-old Gizmo is the only penguin who does not have to wear a bracelet at all. He stands out in his rookery and is known as the friendliest penguin at Seneca Park Zoo. Sapienza says, “Every day when we come in, in the morning, he is the first to meet us at the gate.” Gizmo and his penguin friends get a wide variety of enrichment activities at the zoo. They love popping bubbles and playing with the diving rings and rubber ducks, even bringing the ducks into their nest boxes!
The African penguins are carnivorous and enjoy a steady diet of fish and crustaceans. They rely heavily on sardines and anchovies. They prefer water temperatures between forty and seventy degrees Fahrenheit and have up to seventy feathers per square inch. These feathers are stiff and overlap in layers, trapping air against their skin. This makes them windproof and waterproof. Fun fact: African penguins use their own excrement, called guano, to build nests under bushes and rocks.
Gizmo was born at Seneca Park Zoo on January 8, 2015, and has lived here his entire life. At three-years-old, Tonka is the youngest penguin at the zoo and the oldest is Libby, who just turned thirty-two! Belke loves watching all the penguins interact with each other. “They all have very unique personalities and relationships,” he says. “No two penguins are the same. At times this creates a lot of drama but nothing that isn’t quickly sorted out.”
Rochester seems like a good place for penguins in the winter, but have you ever wondered if they get too hot during the summer? Sapienza explains that most people don’t realize that many penguins do not live in cold weather. African penguins like Gizmo are used to the warm weather, which is why you will not see them outside here in Rochester during the cold winter months. And since all species of penguins live south of the equator, they will never meet a polar bear in the wild.
In 2023, Gizmo’s species was classified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as critically endangered. That means all African penguins in the wild face a critically high level of extinction within the next ten years. Belke explains that the biggest factors causing the species to struggle are related to human interactions such as habitat loss, overfishing, and climate change. Overfishing depletes their food sources, while climate change alters ocean currents and temperatures, further impacting their food availability and habitat. The loss of nesting grounds has also contributed to the species decline.
The public can do its part to help the penguins by supporting conservation organizations such as the South African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB) where volunteers rehabilitate thousands of coastal birds every year that fall victim to oil spills or are orphaned due to lack of fish. People can also reduce how much plastic they use whenever possible and choose sustainable seafood options. The good news is that every time someone visits the Seneca Park Zoo they are already supporting SANCCOB as a portion of every ticket sale is donated to the zoo’s conservation partners.
When Gizmo isn’t pushing through the crowd to spend time with his favorite zookeepers, you can find him in the Rocky Coast Gallery doing a meet and greet with his many fans. He can’t wait for your next visit to the Seneca Park Zoo!
This article originally appeared in the Summer 2025 issue of (585) Kids.
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