Stories tagged king penguins

Act 1, Scene IV: If I profane with my unworthiest hand This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this: My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.
Courtesy prattWatch for this one, everybody, among your local news affiliate’s “feel good” segments; I’m guessing it’ll fall somewhere between “Man tries to rob bank with a banana,” and “llama adopts kitten.”

What we have here, I’d say, is a modern day Romeo and Juliet story. Two young lovers from different families (different classes actually), brought together by fate, kept apart by…um… phenotype. I don’t suppose their parents were very happy either.

Playful confusion or sexual frustration lead a young male fur seal to cruise the beaches of the sub-Antarctic Marion island looking for companionship, and he found it in the form of an adult king penguin of indeterminate sex. Love, as we all know, waits for no man, pinniped, or bird, and so the 200 pound seal went to it there and then, subduing the 30 pound penguin by simply flopping down on top of it,

Unfortunately, the 45-minute exercise in sexual futility was caught on film by a team of South African biologists.

“At first glimpse, we thought the seal was killing the penguin,” says Nico de Bruyn, of the University of Pretoria, “but then we realized that the seal’s intentions were rather more amorous.” Before long, “the brazenness of the seal’s behavior left those who saw it in no doubt as to what was happening.”

I know what you’re all thinking: it meant nothing. Adelie penguins, after all, prostitute themselves for nest stones, chinstrap penguins occasionally swing both ways, and emperor penguins often change partners from one year to the next. King penguins, like Ms. (or Mr.) Juliet here, lead pretty vanilla sex lives, however. No, this wasn’t youthful experimentation; this was love. Biologists who viewed the event think that action may have resulted from some crossed instinctual wires, but, then again, they’re scientists, not famous for their romantic sensibilities.

The BBC reports that this is thought to be the first recorded example of a mammal trying to have sex with a member of another class of vertebrate, such as a bird fish, reptile, or amphibian. I find that hard to believe.

Tags : tragedy, seals, love, king penguins, Antartica

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A king penguin makes his dignified way: to the chopping block.
Courtesy VivaAntarcticaAs Americans, I’m sure we call all agree that regicide is awesome. I mean, we don’t generally participate in it, but we appreciate it. And, say what you will of the French, they have a sympathetic tradition, which makes the alarmist tone of recent findings out of the French Academy of Sciences somewhat surprising: it seems that the guillotine blade of global warming is slowly descending toward the gilded necks of the king penguins.

Despite what we might wish, though, the king penguins are not actually being decapitated. The French (and Norwegian) research team, in fact, began to notice a strong correlation between ocean temperatures, and king penguin breeding success. It makes sense when you think about it—monarchies have always been vulnerable to breeding issues.

Tracking a portion of the 2 million strong population of king penguins on the Crozet Islands, the researchers observed that the penguins were having to travel further and further from their colonies to forage for food (usually between 300 and 600 km, and sometimes as far as 2000 km). The reason for this, scientists believe, is that many marine organisms prosper only at lower ocean temperatures, and king penguins—living at the top of the food chain—depend on these organisms for sustenance. As the waters near their islands warm, nearby food becomes scarce, and the less food the penguins can bring back to their chicks, the smaller their chance of survival becomes. According to the team’s model, an increase in just .26 degrees Celsius will lead to a 9 percent decrease in king penguins’ survival rate.

Bad news if you’re a penguin. Or if you’re into penguins. Or… Maybe I do understand why the French are so nervous about the decline of king penguins—after all, who would better understand what would probably take their place.

Tags : king penguins, penguins, global warming

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