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Penguins are carnivores and eat only sea-food. Their favorite food includes fish (especially anchovies), krill, and squid. Penguins catch food with their beaks and swallow it whole while swimming. Penguins have a spiny throat of which the fish (when consumed) gets stuck in the spines and suffocates to death. The penguin then swallows. They also have powerful jaws to grip slippery prey. Every year, penguins will go through fasting periods (a period of time when they don't eat). Before fasting begins, penguins eat a lot and build a layer of fat in their bodies, which will provide them with energy during the fasting period.

Most penguins feed on schooling fish, krill, and squid. Species that dine mostly on fish have bills that are hooked to help them capture prey, but bill shape alone does not determine what penguins eat. While each species has a favorite food, penguins will eat whatever is available. This flexibility has allowed them to adapt to changes in their environment. Penguins locate prey by sight and this can be problematic because the deeper a penguin dives, the darker it gets. Penguins overcome this because most squid and krill migrate daily to the surface, allowing penguins to stay within 100 meters of the surface. Species that hunt at night take advantage of the bio-luminescence (glow-in-the-dark) nature of prey.

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9y ago

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