African Penguin Day

26 August (international)

Established by the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB) in 2009, African Penguin Day celebrates this much-loved marine bird. SANCCOB's efforts, together with conservation organizations around the world, aim to save the charismatic African Penguin from extinction. The species is "Vulnerable" - there are only 56,000 breeding pairs of African Penguins in the world. This is mainly because their food supply is much smaller than it used to be (people are overfishing the oceans), they are heavily impacted by oil pollution and diseases, and people take their droppings (guano) for fertilizer and steal their eggs.

More info: http://www.sanccob.co.za/africanpenguinday and http://www.africanpenguin.co.za/penguinfacts.html