WATCH: Loyal penguin swims 5,000 miles every year to be reunited with the man who saved his life

Dindim the penguin was on his last legs when retired bricklayer and part-time fisherman Joao Pereira de Souza plucked him from a nearby beach in 2011.

Brazilian Joao nursed the South American Magellanic penguin back to health, cleaning the oil from his feathers and feeding him fish to build up his strength.

Despite Joao's best efforts to release the penguin back into the wild he stayed with his new friend for 11 months, "and then, just after he changed his coat with new feathers, he disappeared,’ Joao recalls.

However it was just a few months later Dindim returned, spotting his fisherman friend and following him home.

Now, every year the trusty penguin spends around eight months of the year with his rescuer and it's believed he spends the rest of the time off the coast of Argentina and Chile where he breeds.

Speaking to the Brazilian TV network, Globo TV the 71-year-old fisherman said, "I love the penguin like it’s my own child and I believe the penguin loves me.

"No one else is allowed to touch him. He pecks them if they do. He lays on my lap, lets me give him showers, allows me to feed him sardines and to pick him up."

Biologist Professor Krajewski, who has interviewed Joao, told The Independent, "I have never seen anything like this before. I think the penguin believes Joao is part of his family and probably a penguin as well."

Penguins are known for their loyalty, staying with the same partner until they die.

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