Penguins can’t resist lure of New Zealand sushi shop
WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND — Two little blue penguins just couldn’t stay away from a New Zealand sushi store, returning to nest there even after police had captured them and escorted them back to the ocean.
Wellington police described them as “waddling vagrants,” while the store’s co-owner joked he age room when he heard a had no idea that word of his sound from near the water tasty raw fish had reached as tank. He walked outside and far as the subaquatic compeered underneath the store munity. and thought he was looking
But Jack Mace, an operaat a pigeon. tions manager for the Depart“And then I was like, ‘Oh ment of Conservation, said my God, it’s a penguin,” he the birds would have sim- said. “I was panicked. I didn’t ply thought they had found know what to do.” a snug burrow underneath He called authorities, but the store and wouldn’t have meanwhile the penguins taken note of what was being waddled out. So he grabbed sold above them. them one by one and put
“They were within pen- them inside the store. He said guin commuting distance of the second penguin pecked the harbor, and they thought at him several times, leaving they’d found a nice spot,” red welts on his chest. Mace said. “It was a bit wild,” he said.
Police got the first call about a penguin loose in the city on Saturday night, after somebody reported spotting a grumpy bird under a parked car. Police said they managed to release it back into the ocean.
Then police starting taking more calls on Monday, July 15, and found two penguins huddled under the Sushi Bi store near the capital’s busy train station.
“The waddling vagrants were removed from their sushi stand refuge earlier today by Constable John Zhu,” police wrote on their Facebook page. “Unsurprisingly, this was not the first report police had received about the fishy birds.”
And it tur n ed out it wouldn’t be the last.
Within hours, the two penguins were back underneath the shop.
Co-owner Long Lin said he was tidying up the stor
Inside the store, the birds strutted about seemingly without a care, to the amazement of worker Shawnee Kim.
“Really cute,” she said. Kim said she tried offering them some fresh salmon, but they didn’t seem interested.
Mace said rangers managed to extract the birds from under the store’s freezer and put them in a special nesting box on the harbor, which is about a 200-meter (660foot) waddle from the store.
Mace said the penguins haven’t been seen since and may be out at sea.
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