Rescuers are trying to rehabilitate an emperor penguin that came ashore some 2,000 miles from its natural habitat, and what comes next is "still being worked through."

An emperor penguin found malnourished far from its Antarctic home on the Australian south coast is being cared for by a wildlife expert, a government department said Monday.

A lone emperor penguin was found malnourished on a popular beach after making the shocking 2,200 mile swim from Antarctica to Australia.

It's not clear how the juvenile male ended up so far north, but experts suggest he was motivated by his appetite

"There was this big bird in the water, and we thought it was another sea bird, but then it kept coming closer to the shore–and it was way too big–and it just stood up and waddled right over to us," Aaron Fowler,

An emperor penguin is being cared for by wildlife experts after becoming the first member of its species to make the 2,200-mile trek from Antarctica to Australia.

An emperor penguin traveled over 2,000 miles from its Antarctic home, appearing on the shores of Ocean Beach in Denmark, a town in Western Australia. This rare sighting, made on November 1, might mark the first recorded visit of an emperor penguin on the Australian continent.