A nesting Magellanic penguin from Argentina’s Punta Tombo reserve in Patagonia.

Hundreds of thousands of Magellanic penguins nest in this critically important wildlife reserve, established in 1979 with help from the Wildlife Conservation Society. WCS continues to monitor populations of nesting penguins, and has tagged tens of thousands of birds over the years to help track their movements.

Protecting nesting penguins is one component of WCS’s Sea and Sky initiative which aims to safeguard not only nesting beaches but also the distant feeding grounds of ocean wanderers including elephant seals, sea lions and albatrosses.