Every winter (spring in the Northern Hemisphere), after having produced a chick, female Emperor penguins (Aptenodytes forsteri) head off to sea for two months to fatten up, while the males stay behind, foodless for over 100 days, to tend the chicks. (The males get their turn to eat later, but often walk about 100 km to get to the water.) With air temperatures as low as -40° C (same in Fahrenheit), and the winds blowing as hard as 140 kph (90 mph), it gets deadly cold. And that’s when the penguins huddle together for warmth.
Here’s a short PBS video of penguin huddles. Note the constant shifting of the birds.
And the huddle really keeps them warm. A 2012 paper in PLOS ONE (screenshot below, pdf here, reference at bottom) reported that the temperature inside the huddle can reach 20°C-37.5°C (68°F-100°F). Individuals outside the huddle, exposed to…
View original post 895 more words
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
Recent Comments