It must be important; it made the front page upon a Sunday.
"True love birds; N.E. Aquarium plays matchmaker to stave off penguin extinction" by David Filipov,
Globe Staff / February 13, 2011
For the lovelorn, Ichaboe and Spheniscus are a couple to envy.
When they reunite after even a short time apart, they call out to each other. They bow in greeting. They slap bills tenderly. She is lovely, her plumage a riot of white and black, her sole adornment an identification band of purple and white tastefully wrapped around her rubbery right wing. He is strapping and bold.
The two African penguins have been together a year, and the glow has yet to fade. They were so enthralled with each other one morning last week that they paid no attention to the New England Aquarium biologists watching the couple’s displays of affection atop Island 2 of the penguin exhibit.
The scientists are more than mere voyeurs. They are trying to save a species that researchers predict will be extinct in the wild in 15 years.
It is not only important that these penguins mate, but that they mate with the right partner, to maintain as diverse a gene pool as possible in captivity.
To ensure that, the aquarium biologists become the matchmakers, arranging marriages between pairs most likely to succeed and snuffing out romances that are not meant to be.
This means they must constantly monitor the love lives of their 10 breeding couples, which the aquarium says is one of the country’s largest collections in captivity.
“We can keep the species alive by making love happen,’’ said Caitlin Hume, whose official title is senior penguin biologist, though it could also be Cupid-in-chief....
I read that and consider my agenda-pushing, war-promoting paper.... sigh.
Penguins enjoy a reputation as nature’s model of monogamous devotion, adorable creatures willing to waddle endlessly across the barren expanses of Antarctica on behalf of their mates and chicks. Ain’t no ice sheet cold enough to stop ‘em.
But African penguins are a different sort of bird. They live off the coast of South Africa and Namibia, nowhere near the South Pole. They might choose mates for life, but they might also cheat if their partners show up late during mating season. They might dump a partner if they just don’t like the match....
I'm thinking of dumping a certain newspaper for good, readers.
African penguins, also known as beach donkeys for their bray-like call, used to be abundant. In 1956, researchers counted 147,000 pairs of African penguins, Hume said. In 2008, only 28,000 of the species were found.
The culprits seem to be overfishing and changes in ocean currents; the schooling fish that African penguins fancy are farther out to sea. The chicks are completely dependent for their first three months, so the adults take turns hunting.
Nowadays, adults need to travel twice as far to bring back food. The chicks and the adults left behind are going longer without sustenance. None of these obstacles exist in the friendly confines of the aquarium....
But sometimes, penguins go looking for love in all the wrong places.
I'm ashamed to admit it; however, that describes my relationship with the Globe. Every day I go in there looking for some semblance of truth and I am constantly disappointed by agenda-pushing garbage.
Hume pointed out Plum Pudding and In-Guza, two African penguins who were preening on Island 3. They got together on their own, but because their genes are bad for breeding, the aquarium did not let their eggs hatch.
Isn't that murder? Or is it a form of incest for penguins?
What if they happened to meet up in the wild instead?
“Sometimes we take a pair that found each other and we have to separate them,’’ Hume said.
And sometimes when one door closes, another opens....
I'm getting ready to slam one shut, readers.
--more--"
