Do penguins feet get cold

While in general it is safe to say that penguins live in cold climates, it is more accurate to say that penguins live in climates that have ready access to cold currents in the ocean. If you take the example of the penguins that live in South Africa, a climate hardly meriting the term "cold," you will see that a penguin can be quite happy in a warmer climate.

But why the need for a cold ocean current nearby? Simple. Food. While we associate warmth on land with fertile growth of plants and thus animals, in the ocean the reverse is also true. The colder currents carry a vast amount of plankton which in turn feed the fish that are the staple diet of the penguin. Many animals such as sea lions, sharks and such have been seen and sometimes live in warm "climates" i.e. in areas that we associate with warmth on land, like San Francisco. But if you have been in the Bay, even in the summer, you notice how cold the water can get, which explains the sea lion's existence there. So penguins would in theory live off the coast of Equatorial Africa, were there currents cold enough to support the types of fish that it requires to survive. Truth is, there is a species that lives off the Galapagos Islands, an island group very near the equator, but very close to a cold current that keeps the local penguin population flush with fish.