Meet the Mega Penguin

Experts believe they have unearthed the remains of the king of all penguins, a six-foot-long flightless bird that ruled over Antarctica 40 million years ago.

According to a study recently published in the journal Geobios, the Palaeeudyptes klekowskii, also known as the "colossus penguin," is the largest penguin known to man.

Unfortunately, you won't seen this tuxedoed giant waddling around on today's shrinking Antarctica ice. Instead, the colossus penguin rule over a wide variety of flightless birds near the South Pole between 40 and 36 million years ago.

"It was a wonderful time for penguins," study author Carolina Acosta Hospitaleche recently told Live Science.

According to the researcher, an estimated 10 to 14 different species all lived together along the Antarctic coast in those ancient times.

Hospitaleche discovered P. klekowskii as she excavated a treasure trove of fossils located on Seymore Island - right off the Antarctic peninsula. There, she reportedly found tens-of-thousands of penguin bones, providing more than adequate knowledge to piece together a nearly-complete colossus penguin skeleton.

Based on skeletal data, the researcher estimated that P. klekowskii weighed more than 250 pounds, and was by far the largest penguin ever seen, living or dead.

For comparison, the average emperor penguin just barely passes 100 pounds.

According to Hospitaleche, the colossus penguin was likely able to stay under water for 40 minutes or more thanks to its remarkable size

What's most interesting about this discovery is that this massive penguin may have been a little better off in modern times, compared to today's penguin species.  Some experts believe that emperor penguins are on the decline because of a warming climate near the poles. Other researchers believe that these penguins are simply retreating to where its colder with thicker ice.

The colossus penguin, however, would have been fine in the sun. Forty-million years ago, Seymour Island was a warmer region, with a climate similar to that of islands near the south-most tip of South America.