Additional Notes on the First Captive Penguins in Japan

Abstract

The first importation of live penguins to Japan took place when two Humboldt Penguins (Spheniscus humboldti) arrived in 1915 from Chile. One of them was donated to the Tokyo Imperial Household Museum Zoo (which later became Ueno Zoological Gardens) on June 9, 1915 by Mr. Isokichi Ozawa, the chief engineer of a Japanese merchant ship with regular service to South America. After its death it was preserved as a stuffed specimen, and its record was found in the specimen database (Tensanbu Daicho) of the Tokyo Imperial Household Museum. After the passing of this penguin, the other individual was purchased by Hanayashiki, an amusement park in the Asakusa district in Tokyo. In 1951, Mr. Haruo Takashima discovered the record for a specimen of the Humboldt Penguin registered by the same specimen number in the Tensanbu Daicho at the National Museum of Nature and Science; he later reported that it was an immature bird (Takashima 1952a). It is now believed that the specimen of the immature Humboldt Penguin at the National Museum of Nature and Science, previously considered to be of unknown origin, was one of those first two living penguins imported into the country. In addition, I found that the penguin illustrated in a traditional Japanese hanging scroll was modeled after the individual kept at Hanayashiki and that it was also an immature bird. This has led this author to assume that immature penguins that were easy to keep, were chosen for shipment to Japan.