African Penguins generally breed on islands where they are safe from terrestrial, mammalian predators. Due to a shift in the distribution of their favoured prey, there is now a mismatch between penguin breeding islands and the fish distribution. Most penguin colonies are on the west coast of South Africa, while the fish have shifted south and eastwards onto the Agulhas Bank. There is a 600 km stretch of coastline between Dyer Island (near Gansbaai) and Gqeberha where there are no islands, and therefore no breeding penguins, but higher fish abundance.
BirdLife South Africa, with our partners CapeNature and SANCCOB, has made enormous progress towards re-establishing a colony in the De Hoop Nature Reserve, along the southern Cape coast, with penguins breeding there since 2022 and up to 20 individuals per year moulting there. BirdLife South Africa is also looking into the feasibility of establishing additional new colonies to help the penguins follow the changed distribution of fish.
Work started at De Hoop in 2018 to construct a predator-proof fence to protect the headland where penguins had previously tried to breed. We also installed life-like penguin decoys (models) and a speaker which plays penguin calls, to make it look and sound like an existing colony. In 2021, with SANCCOB, we started releasing hand-reared juvenile penguins that had been abandoned by their parents to encourage them to return to breed.
Wild penguins arrived in 2022, with one pair breeding that year. Since then, penguins have almost continuously occupied the site, despite one instance of predation by a honey badger. A total of 15 chicks have fledged from the colony.
The De Hoop Nature Reserve is about 250 km east of Cape Town. It is one of the largest natural areas managed by CapeNature and the associated Marine Protected Area (MPA) is one of the largest coastal MPAs in South Africa. African Penguins naturally attempted to establish a colony on the eastern edge of the reserve in 2003. The colony grew to more than 20 pairs in 2006, with about 100 non-breeding penguins roosting there, before predation by terrestrial predators (likely caracal) caused the penguins to abandon the attempt. Sardine and anchovy, the penguins’ favoured prey, are abundant in the waters around the De Hoop Nature Reserve. The data we have gathered when tracking penguins from other colonies suggests that penguins often come to this area to forage when they have finished breeding and are no longer need to remain close to their colonies to feed their chicks.
Wild penguins arrived at the colony in 2022 and the first pair bred that year, successfully raising two chicks. Four pairs bred in 2023, raising 6 chicks between them. Unfortunately, in March 2024, a honey badger managed to get through the fence and killed 11 penguins who were preparing to breed at the colony. Despite this setback, one pair bred that year and raised two chicks. In 2025, three pairs bred, raising hopes that the colony will begin to grow after the honey badger incident. While these numbers are low, other penguins have also visited the colony and some have moulted there, which is another good sign for the future.
