By Julie

The third Antarctic bird braving the cold down at the bottom of the world is another regal penguin: the King. King penguins are unique, skilled, and even wacky! King penguins don’t exactly live in Antarctic. They’re sub-Antarctic, they live around North Antarctica. They’re not the most abundant species of penguin, but they live in humungous colonies of up to 20,000 birds! Kings are a lot like Emperor penguins- they even look almost identical to them, but kings are just a bit smaller and more brightly colored. They have pupils the size of pinheads in the light, but they grow tremendous in the dark. This lets them catch up to 2,000 fish in the dim waters of the sea! It does sort of help that some fish glow in the dark, though. The king penguin babies are a little strange- they don’t look like their parents or even penguins at all! They are almost as large as their penguin parents, plump, fuzzy with no sleek feathers, and brown all over! They look so different that people used to think that they were another species, dubbing them “woolly penguins”! The king penguins eat squid and fish, but the dads can go for a month without food while their mates are at sea! But the babies are even tougher, able to fast for five months at once and lose 68% of their body weight! Parents are able to pick out the voice of their child from hundreds of chicks in a penguin créche, or huddle. When the chicks are in their eggs, adults keep them in their warm brood patches on their feet, the only penguins to not have nests. Parents take turns balancing the egg. Another interesting fact is that most penguins use a little hop to move around, but kings prefer running with their feet. To be able to observe these creatures at work and play would be more amazing than a trip to Hawaii for me.
NOTE: This nonfiction paragraph was part of a school project.

On a bright, cheerful day
Skipping round, giddy with joy and spring
And warm weather
Caressing us with a warm, gentle breeze
The sky is bluer than blue could be
The grass is bright and greener than green
The flowers have sprung from the ground
In a frenzy of bright, colorful petals
Some of which
Flap their wings
And carry on to another back yard
As butterflies and bees.
Suddenly, all is quiet,
A hush comes over the garden,
Our world seems to freeze.
A jewel, a bright jewel of green and blue and red
Rises, over the fence
Hovering in a regal way,
Its long, thin beak turned up.
Humming bird, queen of the garden,
Lands in a sea of flowers
Which bob up and down for her amusement
Takes off again, properly buzzing
The Queen takes a sip
From her royal feeder
Slurping nectar so daintily
So fragile
I can see why this tiny jewel-bright creature
Is a Queen.
The bird, in all her splendor,
Drinks to her pleasure,
Thanks the flowers politely,
Picks her royal self up
And flies away with her royal Queen posture.
I rest back on the grass,
In wonder
Of what I have witnessed:
The Queen of Mother Nature
At teatime!

The dough feels squishy and moist, but floury under my hands. “Squish it, Kimberly, squish it!” Magic squeals in his high, excited voice. Minna giggles. “Squish it!” she agrees. “Squish it flat!” I squish it to Magic and Minna’s preference, then roll it back into a ball to give Minna a turn. She pounds the dough with her fists, squashing it into a lumpy bump, giggling all the while. Magic has gotten a chance to pound the dough into a contorted circle already, so I help my brother and sister pinch the crust and smooth out the bottom of the powdery off-white dough. “Look, a pizza!” Minna giggles. “We’re making a pizza!” Magic screeched excitedly. “Just make sure it’s baked enough, unlike last time.” Nina calls from the living room, in which she is reading one of her old magazines. “We will, this time,” I say, turning to my little siblings. “All right. Now, who wants to do the tomato sauce, cheese, and toppings?” I asked. “Toppings!” Minna shrieks in her four-year-old voice, maybe a bit too loud. “Cheese! Wait- no, tomato sauce. Yeah, cheese. Wait, I like doing the tomato sauce better.” Magic ponders, as if it’s the greatest decision he’ll ever make. “Okay,” I say, not knowing what Magic really decided, and I let him slather on a thin coating of red tomato sauce. But he doesn’t stop at a thin coating. “Um, I think that’s enough,” I say to Magic and Minna’s gales of laughter when the crust is filled with red substance, and wipe about half of it up. How is it that we are always able to use half a jar of the stuff? I sprinkle on the cheese, then finally succumb to Magic’s whining that he wanted to do the cheese and let both of them dump on some shredded mozzarella, moist and cool from the fridge. I don’t care that they sneak fingerfuls of the cheese into their mouths, and I don’t argue that we should put the cheese away. I remember how I was when I helped Nina make pizzas at their age. Luckily, the family likes their pizza very cheesy. Minna’s chubby hands find their way into the mushrooms, peppers, ham, and pepperoni. I help Minna line the outside of the meal with a border of peppers and make a smiley face with the pepperoni. She hasn’t left enough patience for the mushrooms and ham, so they go all over the place. “It’s the smiley guy’s freckles.” Magic observes. I pinch up a bit of garlic, let it loose onto my wrists, spread my arms wide, and fling it out on the pizza. “Cool!” Magic and Minna giggle and squeal, jumping up and down. I let them fling a little bit of garlic around the kitchen (I’d dust it up later), but just a bit because more than a touch can violate the perfect taste of the Italian delicacy. “Can you spin it around on your fingers like the cooks on TV?” Magic asks. “I think you’re supposed to do that with the dough,” I said, “And I don’t think I can, anyway.” Or rather, I didn’t want to risk an overturned pizza. I scooped up the pizza on the black slate and lower it into our old oven. “We made a pizza, we made a pizza!” The little children giggle as I chop up a loaf of Italian bread, Magic butters it, and Minna sprinkles on a tiny bit of garlic (even Minna has learned just to use a bit on the garlic bread). When we have together set the table like waiters and waitresses, poured out water for everyone, and I’ve cut up a fruit plate, the kitchen is filled with the wonderful aroma of a warm pizza dinner. Our mouths water as I remove the pizza from the oven and set the giant smiley face down on the table. When everyone is sat down, Mom cuts it and I take a bite, a bite of a slice of sheer paradise.

Equally important to the Adélie penguin, the other Antarctic species is the exceptionally elegant Emperor penguin. Every winder’s end on this frozen continent, there comes a miraculous, exciting sound, full of wonder. Peck, peck! Peck, peck! The sound of hatching chicks! Why is this so miraculous, exciting, and wonderful? These emperor penguins are the only Antarctic bird to breed in the coldest season- winter! When baby eggs are struggling to thrive, temperatures can drop as low as -80 degrees, 80 degrees lower temperature than a freezer, and winds can get as raging as 125 MPH! How do even adults survive this cold, you wonder? Imagine wearing a thick, thick coat with even 70 feathers per square inch on it. That’s what the amazingly insulated Emperor feels like! Babies, after born, huddle together in créches, little “playgroups” to keep them warm. They also stay in their parents’ brood patch- a warm area under their stomachs- even after they hatch, until they can regulate their own body temperature. Another interesting fact about their way of life is that they can dive 1,752 feet underwater and hold their breath for 18 minutes at a time!!!!! In fact, these penguins are clearly record-breakers. The biggest penguins, they can get up to four feet tall, which is so tall they could walk on the bottom of almost half of the big pool at an average recreation center without a problem! Emperors have black beaks and white bellies with a tinge of orange around their chests. Wait- one more record coming up! Emperors are the only penguins that may never touch land in a lifetime other than ice floes floating in the water! No wonder they’re good swimmers! These penguins are literally the “Amazing Atheletes of Antarctica”. Imagine how amazing it would be to rule Antarctica like a real monarch as one of these awesome emperors.
NOTE: This nonfiction paragraph was written for a school project.