Speaker 1: Oh hey, it's your Internet dad who just learned how
Speaker 1: to mute her mic on zoom. A alleyboard back with
Speaker 1: a shiny new episode of Ologies. This one's coming out
Speaker 1: on April twenty first. Do you know what week it is?
Speaker 2: Y'all?
Speaker 1: It is World Penguin Week. That's not true. April twenty
Speaker 1: fifth is World Penguin Day. There's no such thing as
Speaker 1: World Penguin Week, but I'm declaring it a week World
Speaker 1: Penguin Week. Welcome to it. But before we get to
Speaker 1: the fanfare and all the fun facts, a few thanks
Speaker 1: to everyone on patreon dot com slash Ologies for supporting
Speaker 1: the show. Thank you to everyone tagging their merch photos
Speaker 1: Ologies merch so we can repost them. Thank you to
Speaker 1: everyone who has rated and subscribed on Apple Podcasts and
Speaker 1: all the other platforms, especially those leaving reviews to booy
Speaker 1: the bad days, such as sailor Thought, who says weirdly
Speaker 1: meditative listening. I've been listening Toologies for quite some time,
Speaker 1: but Quarantine has made me appreciate this beautiful podcast more
Speaker 1: than ever. I listened to old episodes every single night
Speaker 1: to help me turn my anxiety off. Thank you, Edward.
Speaker 1: You're welcome sailor thought, let's get to some penguins. Let's
Speaker 1: get him in your ears, in your brains, in your hearts. Penguinology.
Speaker 1: It's a real thing. It has been for years. We'll
Speaker 1: discuss shortly. So I became aware of this ology after
Speaker 1: approximately one million of you tweeted me a photo of
Speaker 1: this ologist maybe a year and a half ago with
Speaker 1: the chiron, which is the graphic as the lower third
Speaker 1: of the TV screen that says who someone is. And
Speaker 1: this ologist identified on the BBC as a penguinologist. Oh
Speaker 1: and who better to call it that than one of
Speaker 1: the world's foremost penguin experts. He's legit. Penguinology is thus legit.
Speaker 1: So we have been in touch for months and months,
Speaker 1: but I had to wait for him to be in
Speaker 1: not Antarctica, and then we hopped on the phone. He
Speaker 1: from the UK where it was evening and he was
Speaker 1: settling in to relax and get barraged with idiot questions
Speaker 1: from me, your stupid podcast host. So he is a
Speaker 1: research fellow at Oxford University's zoological department. He spent well
Speaker 1: over a decade working and studying and very gently buying
Speaker 1: on penguins. And heads up Penguin watch dot org, where
Speaker 1: you yourself can go and see wonderful penguins in remote
Speaker 1: regions on planet Earth. You can join eleven thousand volunteers
Speaker 1: who help scientists, including him, count penguins just by looking
Speaker 1: at pictures of penguins and just putting a dot on
Speaker 1: the penguins. It's so good and quick. Audio note if
Speaker 1: you hear any clickity clacking, that is just the keyboard
Speaker 1: in my shared home office with Jarrett, So just consider
Speaker 1: it like an ASMR treat. Okay, great, Okay. So we
Speaker 1: talked about what it's like working on the ends of
Speaker 1: the Earth and how cold it is, and what exactly
Speaker 1: is a penguin and how do they stay warm and
Speaker 1: mating habits and weird knees and bad parents and neck
Speaker 1: facts and diets and swimming and waddling and Pooh and
Speaker 1: you and how you can help out our feathered friends.
Speaker 1: So observe this World Penguin Week by slipping on a
Speaker 1: tux and sliding down the ice to join us for
Speaker 1: one of the most anticipated episodes of Ologies maybe ever
Speaker 1: with penguinologist doctor Tom Hart. Okay, it looks like we're
Speaker 1: off sync, but I swear it'll work in the audio. Okay,
Speaker 1: we're business, right, you're Tom Heart. You're a penguinologist. Yes,
Speaker 1: this is so thrilling. I'm not sure if you understand
Speaker 1: how thrilling this is. You are perhaps like the best
Speaker 1: person to ask about penguins, but also you're the best
Speaker 1: person to have an ologies because you are a self
Speaker 1: titled penguinologist.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what was the moment that you decided that your
Speaker 1: lower third should say peguinologists.
Speaker 2: I'm a bit nerved by calling it my life a third.
Speaker 2: That sounds a bit invasive. But it was a BBC
Speaker 2: interview on Emperor Penguins, and I think I've been calling
Speaker 2: myself that for a few years and it's half joke,
Speaker 2: but it's half it's informative. It just tells people what
Speaker 2: you do. So the whole point is they usually they
Speaker 2: usually laugh and then they ask why what, And at
Speaker 2: that point you've got people. So it's the most honest
Speaker 2: ologist in that It's not everything I do. It could
Speaker 2: be you know, anything from model and molecular biology to
Speaker 2: ecologist or behaviorist, but largely when I'm talking about penguins,
Speaker 2: and particularly when I'm trying to conserve them. It makes
Speaker 2: sense to just say I'm a penguinologist. People know exactly
Speaker 2: what it is, and it is a little bit of
Speaker 2: a joke. But at the same time, when when people
Speaker 2: have kind of fought me on it, I pushed back
Speaker 2: twice as high because it is transparent and that's what
Speaker 2: we should be doing.
Speaker 1: Do you have other academics who are penguin researchers can
Speaker 1: tell you that it's not a protocol.
Speaker 2: I've had a few turn the noises up, but largely no.
Speaker 2: I think people are coming around. I mean it makes
Speaker 2: the point, and actually, through both outreach and engagement, I've
Speaker 2: been able to do a lot, so I think any
Speaker 2: early cynicism is fading now.
Speaker 1: M h. I mean you're here with us now, and
Speaker 1: would you have done?
Speaker 2: That's that absolute pinnacle of my career.
Speaker 1: Doctor Tom Hart is a globally celebrated expert on seabirds,
Speaker 1: having been an author on paper such as high coverage
Speaker 1: genomes to llucinate, the evolution of penguins and divergent trophic
Speaker 1: responses of sympatric penguin species to historic anthropogenic exploitation and
Speaker 1: recent climate change. But those things, let's be honest, pale
Speaker 1: when compared to watching me fumble through my abject penguin
Speaker 1: in ignorance overscape. I'm sure. So where did it all start?
Speaker 1: When did you start liking birds and zoology and conservation?
Speaker 2: Oh, very early on, I think anytime from about age ten.
Speaker 2: I probably wanted to bring a marine biologist. I definitely
Speaker 2: like biology and I like the marine environment, and so
Speaker 2: it was that or lifeboat crew or something like that.
Speaker 2: But yeah, it's no surprise to ten year old me,
Speaker 2: who's pretty toughed with it. It's kind of no surprise.
Speaker 2: And yet at the same time, it could have been
Speaker 2: a lot of other things that make a difference and
Speaker 2: our conservation related.
Speaker 1: Did you always want to go on remote expeditions as
Speaker 1: part of your work or did it just so happen
Speaker 1: that penguins was an area that you kind of gravitated
Speaker 1: toward or that needed yourope you working on it.
Speaker 2: I think I definitely wanted to go remote. But again,
Speaker 2: the exact ending up in Antarctica is is a mild
Speaker 2: surprise because you're not told as a kid it's possible.
Speaker 2: I mean, you're told the standard jobs and no one
Speaker 2: ever mentioned this, and actually, really almost any job in
Speaker 2: science or a lot of them. If you're doing it right,
Speaker 2: you're inventing a new job that didn't exist for the
Speaker 2: previous generation because you're trying to push boundaries. So to
Speaker 2: some degree that's fair. But at the same time, yeah,
Speaker 2: no one told me that as a kid that I
Speaker 2: should be looking to work in Antarctica or even though
Speaker 2: it was possible.
Speaker 1: How many times have you been to Antarctica for your work?
Speaker 2: I have any clue?
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, so that many?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I genuinely don't know, but it's I think it's
Speaker 2: it's something like thirteen seasons worth over about fifteen years,
Speaker 2: so I've missed a couple of seasons since I started.
Speaker 2: What is it?
Speaker 1: What was it like the first time you went?
Speaker 2: Genuinely life changing? Yeah, because yeah, it's life changing in
Speaker 2: the sense that it's like saying wonders of world, knowing
Speaker 2: that it's changing. It's very eye opening to put things
Speaker 2: in global context, as well as being personally very rewarding.
Speaker 2: So yes, it's definitely, I mean, I think or inspiring,
Speaker 2: awesome that I overused, but life changing in the sense
Speaker 2: that you know there and then your life is not
Speaker 2: going to be the same. Absolutely, a few.
Speaker 1: Of the places he commutes to for work are the
Speaker 1: Sandwich Islands and South Georgia, which are little dispects, no
Speaker 1: bigger than one hundred miles long way off the coast
Speaker 1: of Argentina, just above the continent of Antarctica. Now Anarctica,
Speaker 1: the continent. Who even owns it? I asked Google for us, Well,
Speaker 1: it was air quotes discovered only about one hundred years ago.
Speaker 1: Doesn't really belong to anyone. It's likened to a condominium politically,
Speaker 1: with different countries having jurisdiction and putting research stations there.
Speaker 1: And there was a nineteen fifty nine Antarctic Treaty It
Speaker 1: essentially said, hey, nobody answers, okay, now parts of Antarctica,
Speaker 1: how cold can they get? Negative eighty nine degrees celsius.
Speaker 1: That's negative one hundred and twenty eight fahrenheit. And it's
Speaker 1: a polar desert. It's blustery, it's cold, it's white, it's icy,
Speaker 1: it's pristine, it's gorgeous. Now, in terms of critters, you
Speaker 1: got your orcas, you got some seals, some albatross, you
Speaker 1: got some shrimpy little krill munchies in the water, and
Speaker 1: of course penguins. Now, for Tom, why penguins.
Speaker 2: It wasn't really penguins, It was studying the Southern Ocean
Speaker 2: and trying to conserve it. So, if anything, I was
Speaker 2: attracted to the Antarctic Treaty and the idea that no
Speaker 2: one known Antarctica and that if you could show what
Speaker 2: the problem was, they had to fix it. That's a
Speaker 2: little bit naive with the politics, but it's still somewhat true.
Speaker 2: It's a place where knowledge can make a real difference.
Speaker 2: Antarctica is were and would I'd kind of distinguish between
Speaker 2: Antarctica and the Southern Ocean. So a lot of Antarctica
Speaker 2: is different from the stereotype of just cold, white and windy.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's definitely true, but it's incredibly diverse. No
Speaker 2: one goes to Antarctica and knowing what it's like because
Speaker 2: although you've seen it on the telly, it's vastly different
Speaker 2: from that. And so everyone everyone goes to Antarctica with us,
Speaker 2: you know, with some kind of story about how they
Speaker 2: got there, but at the same time, no one knows
Speaker 2: what it's like until they're there.
Speaker 1: What is it like going to study penguins, Like does
Speaker 1: a guy with a pipe and a wiry beard drop
Speaker 1: you off of a research vessel, just like later suckers
Speaker 1: see you in three months.
Speaker 2: In a word, now, it would be a bad season
Speaker 2: for us if we ended up in the same place
Speaker 2: for three months. So we want to hit as many
Speaker 2: sites as possible. And that's how we change data and
Speaker 2: knowledge about Antarctica is by to a lot of sense
Speaker 2: going to a lot of different sites for very little
Speaker 2: and leaving things like time lapse cameras in there in
Speaker 2: place for a whole year that record a whole year
Speaker 2: with us only there maybe for three hours. So yeah,
Speaker 2: now we do still go places in camp, but largely
Speaker 2: it's we're getting dropped off somewhere for a few hours
Speaker 2: or a couple of days, and then we moved on.
Speaker 1: Ah, it's like a very adventurous science cruise, a cruiser
Speaker 1: see a couple hour.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean we hitch hike on tour ships all
Speaker 2: the time. I mean that's how we really, Yeah, that's
Speaker 2: how we do a lot of our work. I mean
Speaker 2: that's it's not joke. It's the most efficient way we
Speaker 2: can work. A tourship will drop you off, usually near penguins,
Speaker 2: because they want people to see them for a few hours,
Speaker 2: and then they well, they're maneuvering somewhere else. You're having lunch,
Speaker 2: then you sleep, you know, you wake up and do
Speaker 2: it again. It's an incredibly efficient way to get around
Speaker 2: an enormous number of penguin colonies. Yeah, hitchhiking is how
Speaker 2: we've been able to do so much. So we've got
Speaker 2: a major benefactor called Quark Expeditions. They're incredible with us.
Speaker 2: But equally, you know, we have phoned people up out
Speaker 2: of the blue saying, I gather you're going somewhere interesting.
Speaker 1: Hello on Tom Hart, doctor Tom Hart, penguinologist.
Speaker 2: And usually they give us a space.
Speaker 1: And now, when you're talking about these colonies, how many
Speaker 1: penguins are we talking and what species? Tell me about
Speaker 1: these penguins as someone who's never seen a penguin outside of.
Speaker 2: A zoo, why not?
Speaker 1: Why have I not? It's a great question. I live
Speaker 1: in la not a lot of penguins here other than
Speaker 1: zoo penguins, which Tom says just aren't the same.
Speaker 2: No, wild penguins are impressive because of the numbers of colony.
Speaker 2: You know, the numbers in a colony and seeing them
Speaker 2: in a in a natural habitat is totally different. So
Speaker 2: fix that please, that's.
Speaker 1: Okay, I will, I'll get of ground rule. What is it?
Speaker 1: What is a colony like? How many will will kind
Speaker 1: of coalesce together? How many?
Speaker 2: It entirely dispends depends on the species and where you are.
Speaker 2: So so in Antarctica, on the kind of mainland continent
Speaker 2: of Antarctica, the colonies are actually often quite a lot smaller.
Speaker 2: So gent two penguins are dailies. They're often in colonies
Speaker 2: of about three five thousand, with a few exceptions. So
Speaker 2: when you get into the Ross Sea, they can be
Speaker 2: a lot bigger. They might be several hundred thousand. Emperor
Speaker 2: penguins on sea ice there are very varied, but yeah,
Speaker 2: it could be anything from a couple of thousand two again,
Speaker 2: one hundred thousand, so.
Speaker 1: A colony could be as populous as the city of Boulder, Colorado,
Speaker 1: or even Vacaville or West Covina, Hi, West Covina.
Speaker 2: The largest colonies on Earth are in the South Sandwich Islands,
Speaker 2: and those are well, they were we haven't finished counting
Speaker 2: them recently, but they were one point three million pairs.
Speaker 2: And that's a lot of penguins.
Speaker 1: And are you using drones and mathematical calculations to figure
Speaker 1: out how many are in these huge colonies.
Speaker 2: Yeah, everything we do is a mixture of I mean,
Speaker 2: we're always trying to post the tech to get something.
Speaker 2: I mean we're basically always playing catch up. These colonies
Speaker 2: are too big, they're understudied, and we want the answer
Speaker 2: fast enough to do something about usually declined. So yeah,
Speaker 2: the big thing is time lapse cameras, so that records,
Speaker 2: you know, a year in the life of a colony,
Speaker 2: and as many images as we can get we want
Speaker 2: to process. So if we can take a photo every hour,
Speaker 2: we get the timing of breeding and success and things
Speaker 2: like that. If we can take a photo every minute
Speaker 2: during breeding season, then we get feeding behavior, foraging and
Speaker 2: all of that stuff, which is you know, has not
Speaker 2: been possible on the scale we're talking about of hundreds
Speaker 2: of colonies simultaneously. So yeah, we need a mixture of
Speaker 2: citizen science and machine learning. So we need all the
Speaker 2: kind of AI tools and crowdsourcing if we're ever going
Speaker 2: to do this. But yeah, we're always pushing. It's things
Speaker 2: like drones with collaborators, it's satellite imagery.
Speaker 1: Let's pack up a minute, let's just waddle on backwards.
Speaker 1: And now basic stupid questions about penguins. What exactly makes
Speaker 1: a bird of penguin?
Speaker 2: Well common ancestry. I mean they're monophyletic, which means they
Speaker 2: evolved once and then everything else is diversified within them.
Speaker 1: Oh so it's thought that penguins diverged from the ancestors
Speaker 1: of albatrosses and petrels seventy one million years ago. What
Speaker 1: is a petrol you're asking, It's a good question. I
Speaker 1: didn't know. It's a tube nosed, short winged seabird. And
Speaker 1: if you squint at a picture of a petrol, you
Speaker 1: can kind of see the resemblance to a penguin. It's
Speaker 1: kind of like looking at two brothers with wildly different
Speaker 1: haircuts and one of them can fly. But penguins, penguins,
Speaker 1: you are great swimmers. This is not a contest.
Speaker 2: What makes them a penguin in terms of if you're
Speaker 2: going to describe emits quite a large seabird. Seabirds tend
Speaker 2: to be larger on average than other birds, but large
Speaker 2: they don't have hollow bones, so they've by giving up
Speaker 2: the ability to fly, they've become a lot more, a
Speaker 2: lot better adapted at diving and swimming. That's also allowed
Speaker 2: their feathers to change, So those are more about hydrodynamics
Speaker 2: and insulation obviously. Yeah, there's a lot of cold adaptations,
Speaker 2: both anatomically and behaviorally as well. But one of the
Speaker 2: big things that people forget is just starvation tolerant. I
Speaker 2: mean you think of the emperor penguins, the males that
Speaker 2: are incubating an egg and then a chick for about
Speaker 2: three four months. That's a lot of it. So any
Speaker 2: other species they molt all at the same time. So
Speaker 2: flying birds they melt several feathers at a time so
Speaker 2: that they can still fly.
Speaker 1: So a few weeks ago, in case you missed this,
Speaker 1: we covered it in plumology. But flying birds will lose
Speaker 1: a flight feather from one side and then the other.
Speaker 1: That way they can keep balance, and some species, like
Speaker 1: parrots and pelicans, it can take them up to two
Speaker 1: years to replace all those ding dang feathers. But our penguins,
Speaker 1: penguins are your friends who cannonball into a pool instead
Speaker 1: of dipping a toe in. They are right or die
Speaker 1: all at once. Let's do this.
Speaker 2: Penguins all have this catus traphic molt where they then
Speaker 2: go to sea for a week or so, feed up
Speaker 2: as much as they can, and then they stand in
Speaker 2: one place, looking grumpy, losing all of their feathers before
Speaker 2: the winter.
Speaker 1: Oh what is the evolutionary advantage of doing it all
Speaker 1: at once?
Speaker 2: I'm not sure, but I think it's so that. I
Speaker 2: think it's so they don't lose foraging efficiency when they're breeding,
Speaker 2: and then because they can't do it over winter, they
Speaker 2: need I mean, they want to go into winter with
Speaker 2: peak condition for their feathers.
Speaker 1: And what are some behaviors in penguins that are so different? Like,
Speaker 1: what are some of the behaviors that are so endearing
Speaker 1: about penguins or that are that are shitty people?
Speaker 2: I mean, do we have to call it endearing? I
Speaker 2: think we don't. They deserve a respect, okay comment? I
Speaker 2: mean the ones everyone knows about is the one, the
Speaker 2: one a lot of people think of is huddling and emperors,
Speaker 2: but that really is almost only in emperors for the
Speaker 2: breeding king penguins that look very similar but are in
Speaker 2: the sub Antarctic in places like South Georgia, they also
Speaker 2: huddle over winter, but only the chicks, so the chicks
Speaker 2: get left behind. And you see these massive aggregations of
Speaker 2: chicks huddling to keep warm. So mostly it's a thing
Speaker 2: that's found in chicks rather than rather than the adults,
Speaker 2: and it's a mixture of trying to avoid big predators
Speaker 2: pecking at you as well as to stay warm.
Speaker 1: Come on, a bunch of fuzzy groundbirds in tuxedos having
Speaker 1: an icy cuddle party. Let me have this, also a
Speaker 1: quick who's who of penguins? Are you ready for this?
Speaker 1: There are seventeen to twenty different species, and my understanding
Speaker 1: is that there are more than twenty penguinologists who disagree
Speaker 1: about subspecies, but either way. On the shores of Antarctica
Speaker 1: we have emperor penguins. These are the big guys, three
Speaker 1: to four feet tall. They have this sheen of golden
Speaker 1: yello on their face and chest. And then there are
Speaker 1: smaller daily penguins which have very simple curved lines that
Speaker 1: black and white, and daily penguins look like mid century
Speaker 1: modern of penguin design, very simple, so elegant. King penguins
Speaker 1: look like smaller emperor penguins, and they're in the northern
Speaker 1: reaches of Antarctica and the Falkland Islands, and chin strap
Speaker 1: penguins they look like they're sporting a little black bike helmet.
Speaker 1: They live on the islands in the Scotia Sea. Gentoos
Speaker 1: are on the Antarctic Peninsula and the nearby islands, and
Speaker 1: they're the ones with the orange feet and the matching
Speaker 1: orange bill. Gentoos are like those ladies with nice shoes
Speaker 1: and handbags that go together. Crested penguins those are the
Speaker 1: ones with the bananas, yellowish spiky things near their eyes.
Speaker 1: They have a very speak to the manager haircut, and
Speaker 1: they include rock hoppers and Macaroni penguins, named not for
Speaker 1: the pasta but for the flamboyant men's fashion style of
Speaker 1: macaronism of the seventeen hundreds. Now there are banded penguins
Speaker 1: which have kind of a racing stripe around their bellies.
Speaker 1: Those are in South America and South Africa. They include
Speaker 1: the jackass. There are yellow eyed penguins in New Zealand
Speaker 1: and the sub Antarctic Islands. And finally, finally, little penguins.
Speaker 1: Those are on the Southern Australia Coast and New Zealand
Speaker 1: and they have a bluish tint to their feathers and
Speaker 1: they're teeny just over a foot tall, maybe three apples
Speaker 1: high and blue motion to call them smurf penguins whirled
Speaker 1: all right. Also, thirty seven million years ago there was
Speaker 1: a colossus penguin which stood, oh my god, six feet
Speaker 1: eight inches tall, the same height as Lebron James. So
Speaker 1: if you take nothing else from Ologies as a podcast,
Speaker 1: just know that at one point on planet Earth there
Speaker 1: were groups that look like entire NBA basketball leagues consisting
Speaker 1: only of ginormous as penguins.
Speaker 2: The movement around the colony is phenomenal. Really, it is
Speaker 2: a bit like a city in their respect that you've got.
Speaker 2: You know, you've got loads of nests that are kind
Speaker 2: of really regularly spaced, and so there's just penguins looking
Speaker 2: quite stoic, staying in one place, and then these massive
Speaker 2: highways of movement and partner exchanges so they can't leave
Speaker 2: the egg. So you see a lot of what you
Speaker 2: see minute to minute is penguins huddled over on a
Speaker 2: nest and then occasionally one relieving it and the next
Speaker 2: one going to see So the behaviors you see are
Speaker 2: largely the kind of stoic ones, the ability to stay
Speaker 2: in one place and stay warm for a long time.
Speaker 2: And then it's really really visibly about the dedication to
Speaker 2: an egg and then a chick, And how.
Speaker 1: Do they find their nests? Again, do you guys know?
Speaker 2: No, but I think if it's known, I don't know it,
Speaker 2: but I it doesn't bother me. I mean I think
Speaker 2: if I could roughly find It's like in a crowd,
Speaker 2: you wouldn't say, oh, you're so clever that you can
Speaker 2: find a human in a crowd. I mean you'd go
Speaker 2: to where you last saw them. Then you might call,
Speaker 2: and you know, it's not it's not that hard. We're
Speaker 2: giving them undue credit in that's we could probably do that.
Speaker 1: Do they have certain calls for each other?
Speaker 2: Absolutely? So they have, particularly between chicks and adults, and
Speaker 2: then between the adults. Between the partners, it's probably more tone.
Speaker 2: So I'm sure they can recognize them by voice, but
Speaker 2: a lot of it, we think is tone. So it's
Speaker 2: like you come home say to a partner, how are you?
Speaker 2: How are you dear? Or someone says how was your
Speaker 2: day and you say, oh fine, and they say, right,
Speaker 2: what's wrong? So tone is probably more important than what
Speaker 2: they're saying, because that to us, it seems like they're
Speaker 2: saying the same thing all the time.
Speaker 1: These calls can vary wildly between species, but most that
Speaker 1: I heard, when it went down too deep a rabbit hole,
Speaker 1: sounded like lovelorn horny kazoos. Mm hmm.
Speaker 2: Oh.
Speaker 1: And what about monogamy. I know people love to cite
Speaker 1: penguins as these pillars of monogamy, but no animal really is.
Speaker 2: Definitely no birds, definitely no bad. I mean they're they're
Speaker 2: I mean they're pretty monogamous. To give them their due,
Speaker 2: and particularly if something works, they they stick with it.
Speaker 2: If it doesn't work or if the partner doesn't come back,
Speaker 2: they move on. Then within a season there's also some
Speaker 2: extra pair copulation. Oh hey, that I think estimates better
Speaker 2: are roughly ten percent. Penguins have been used justification for
Speaker 2: a lot by all on the political spectrum, and that's
Speaker 2: absolutely fair. We can infer good qualities from penguins if
Speaker 2: we also are prepared to poe where we sleep and
Speaker 2: eat more crill. And outside of that, I think we
Speaker 2: should leave them to be penguins.
Speaker 1: So what about same sex penguin couples. Does that only
Speaker 1: happen in captivity or is that in the world as well.
Speaker 2: I don't know if it's been conclusively shown in the world.
Speaker 2: But I would expect it to happen. So that's almost
Speaker 2: like giving humans too much credit to say that we're
Speaker 2: the only ones that can do it. So no, I mean,
Speaker 2: I'm positive it's there, I'm not sure. It's an interesting
Speaker 2: research question.
Speaker 1: Okay, look this up. And there have been studies like
Speaker 1: one published in the journal Ethology in twenty ten, which
Speaker 1: found that same sex courtship displays were common twenty eight
Speaker 1: percent of fifty three displaying pairs in a study of
Speaker 1: king penguins, and then a fraction of those went on
Speaker 1: to learn each other's calls and bond as couples. Ten
Speaker 1: out of ten would happily bake a cake for their nutshaales.
Speaker 1: But Tom says there are more interesting questions to be had.
Speaker 1: What is he working on.
Speaker 2: In the field. We're generally like, we get landed somewhere
Speaker 2: by small rubber boat called a zodiac, and we jump off,
Speaker 2: and we might be changing a camera and hoping it's working.
Speaker 2: They usually do, but you know, you're very trying to
Speaker 2: get the data down. Often fly a drone so we
Speaker 2: can do all the counts, so we can get spacings
Speaker 2: of penguins and things like that, and then we're often sampling,
Speaker 2: which is picking up feathers and taking Pooh samples. That's
Speaker 2: the quid stuff. So from those, the cameras are getting behavior.
Speaker 2: The drone will be looking at counts and also spaceial
Speaker 2: structure of the colony. Then Pooh samples are everything. Biologists
Speaker 2: do love Pooh. It's a great record. So that is
Speaker 2: everything from diseases to diet and stress. We're doing more
Speaker 2: with that in over time. I mean at the moment
Speaker 2: we're looking at disease, but we also have plans on
Speaker 2: diets and stress.
Speaker 1: For more on these topics, see the recent scatology episode
Speaker 1: on poop or plumology on feathers.
Speaker 2: Oh, and then also feathers, we can often see what
Speaker 2: they've been eating over time.
Speaker 1: We would use hair and forensics absolutely.
Speaker 2: I mean it's grown once, but it's grown in one year,
Speaker 2: but over a period. That was the ground whee. By
Speaker 2: the way, that's Mike Polito's work that I just took
Speaker 2: credit for. But sure you won't mind. I picked up
Speaker 2: some of the.
Speaker 1: Feathers, and you know, when it comes to populations for penguins,
Speaker 1: I'm afraid to ask, how are they doing?
Speaker 2: Largely fairly poorly? Some of them, some of them are
Speaker 2: doing well. So gent penguins and king penguins are doing
Speaker 2: pretty well. Largely they're kind of the climate change winners.
Speaker 2: Also king penguins, they were probably exploited in the past,
Speaker 2: so there's a kind of rebound from that. The ones
Speaker 2: that are within Antarctica or the Southern Ocean, the ones
Speaker 2: that are really dependent on krill and ice, are doing
Speaker 2: very poorly. Dailies and chin straps are doing very poorly
Speaker 2: in the Scotia Arc. Dailies are actually doing pretty well.
Speaker 2: Over in East Antarctica, which is the bit south of Australia,
Speaker 2: They're doing pretty well there where the sea ice is
Speaker 2: relatively stable. But actually you come outside of the Southern Ocean,
Speaker 2: come to South America, South Africa, and actually those temperate
Speaker 2: or subtemperate species, those are the ones that are doing
Speaker 2: really badly. I mean they have crashed and that is
Speaker 2: hard to say, but it's likely a mixture of direct
Speaker 2: disturbance and fishing and in some cases actually guano extraction
Speaker 2: as well, where they took historic depth positions of poo
Speaker 2: to use for fertilizer and so that's actually destroyed habitat
Speaker 2: where all the warmer weather burrowing penguins would burrow to
Speaker 2: have their nests stewing poo.
Speaker 1: Poor no tur davery please, And so it's more using
Speaker 1: it for industry rather than just sightseeing. That is the disturbance.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, yeah, so, I mean that's historic. Fishing is still
Speaker 2: very much going on even in Antarctica, and tourism is
Speaker 2: an issue, but it's also sort of essential. I mean,
Speaker 2: we need people to keep an eye on other people
Speaker 2: down there, so you actually need this kind of standoff
Speaker 2: of tourism versus national programs to actually enforce them to
Speaker 2: flag up pollution events and things like that. I mean,
Speaker 2: tourists largely are pretty well controlled, so I would say
Speaker 2: they are they have to be part of the solution.
Speaker 1: So don't feel bad about going to visit a penguin colony.
Speaker 2: No, No, if it's well run, I mean, if they're
Speaker 2: telling you to stay five to ten meters away. All
Speaker 2: of the tourism in Antarctica is pretty well regulated. I'm
Speaker 2: not sure that's true around the world where they're near
Speaker 2: human populations. Mm hmm.
Speaker 1: Stupid question. Do you have a favorite type of penguin?
Speaker 1: No comment, No comment. Wow, That means yes. Yes, that
Speaker 1: means yes.
Speaker 2: The arsiest one. There is one species that is absolutely
Speaker 2: Can I slag off New Yorkers or Londoners? Okay? So
Speaker 2: am I going to get hate mail though?
Speaker 1: Yes, Okay, we're just going to direct this towards Londoners
Speaker 1: because New York it's been a rough couple of months.
Speaker 1: We see you and we love you, and wow, this
Speaker 1: is going to take some needling to get Tom to
Speaker 1: shit tuk A penguin species, right.
Speaker 2: So there are Okay, well it's Macroni penguins and basically,
Speaker 2: if you look at a clony of Macaroni penguins, they
Speaker 2: would steal your hub caps. They would. They're just wonderful.
Speaker 2: So they're charismatic in the level of aggression that they
Speaker 2: show each other. And it's a lot like imagine that
Speaker 2: you've sat at a table in some cafe in either
Speaker 2: London or New York just watching all of this go down.
Speaker 2: That's Macaroni's.
Speaker 1: So they're scoundrels, yeah, admirably, So okay, I'll take it. Yes,
Speaker 1: I can't believe I got that out of you. I'm
Speaker 1: so excited. Can I ask you a questions.
Speaker 2: Easily?
Speaker 1: It's them, it's the wine. Can I ask you questions
Speaker 1: from listeners. But before your questions, each week we donate
Speaker 1: two cause of the ologists choosing, and this week we
Speaker 1: did two. He had two picks and I was like,
Speaker 1: let's do it man. So one is Terrestrial Restoration Action
Speaker 1: Society Sechelles which plants mangroves and how with deforestation along
Speaker 1: coastal regions, which also helps to offset carbon footprints associated
Speaker 1: with global travel. So jet setters, that's a good one,
Speaker 1: an excellent choice. Another donation is going to Penguin Watch,
Speaker 1: which helps fund doctor Hart's work alongside his collaborators around
Speaker 1: the world who research the threats to penguins and how
Speaker 1: to mitigate these threats using long term monitoring in the
Speaker 1: field and using genetic analysis of penguin feathers to get
Speaker 1: a complete picture of how populations are changing. So donations
Speaker 1: went to both organizations. That was made possible by sponsors
Speaker 1: of the show, which you may hear about.
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Speaker 1: Links to those sponsors and the charities are in the
Speaker 1: show notes. But now your questions, stupid questions from wonderful listeners.
Speaker 1: Zoe wants to know. Do penguins smell more fishy or
Speaker 1: more birdy fishy?
Speaker 2: But they sort of smell They smell seabirdy, seabirdy. So
Speaker 2: it's a mixture of raw sewage mixed in with ammonium. Okay,
Speaker 2: but it's wonderful after a while, you just anosmia is
Speaker 2: a great thing. Your your nose has a lot of
Speaker 2: nerves that talk to each other, and after a while
Speaker 2: you don't smell it.
Speaker 1: Okay, and imagine it probably imprints as comfort as I'm Yeah.
Speaker 2: Maybe, or occasionally if someone opens a bag in the
Speaker 2: lab or a notebook or something you get, it all
Speaker 2: comes back quite quick.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Ol Factory nostalgia. I'm sure is pretty hard smell.
Speaker 1: Could Elena Clemenkin Charles. First question asker wants to know
Speaker 1: what does a penguin feel like? What is their texture?
Speaker 1: But also if you squeeze them just a little bit,
Speaker 1: would they be squishy or really solid?
Speaker 2: They would be really solid and they would hurt you back. Okay,
Speaker 2: they're feathery. They'd feel like a strong, muscled like duck
Speaker 2: or you know, nothing, like nothing like most of your pets.
Speaker 2: That's the key. They wouldn't feel they wouldn't feel soft
Speaker 2: and squishy like a dog or a cat. They're they
Speaker 2: are bulls of muscle.
Speaker 1: And also their bones are not hollow. So are they
Speaker 1: denser than your typical bird?
Speaker 2: They're definitely. Yeah, they're definitely heavier than than yeah, than
Speaker 2: any equivalent size. And also they use their flippers as weapons,
Speaker 2: both on each other and on on passing researchers. So yeah,
Speaker 2: they will they will flip a whacky if you get
Speaker 2: too close.
Speaker 1: Have you ever been slapp by a penguin?
Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Does it hurt?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Okay, are they are there flippers also feathered? Right?
Speaker 2: Yes, they're very small feathers so those yeah, those are wings.
Speaker 2: They are flying underwater. But the feathers on a flipper
Speaker 2: are very small. It's almost like a shark skin where
Speaker 2: they're trying to shed small vortices, so they don't get
Speaker 2: a lot of drack. So yeah, it's like a one
Speaker 2: way samdpaper kind of thing.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, okay. I looked up photos of penguin feathers
Speaker 1: and yes, on the flippers they're very little and they
Speaker 1: overlap kind of like roof tiles. And then on the
Speaker 1: body there is some serious fluff under the shiny surface,
Speaker 1: so that's good to keep out the chill. Maybe serves
Speaker 1: as padding for body to boggeting. Perhaps, Sabina KIARTI wants
Speaker 1: to know. Do penguins really slide on the ice as
Speaker 1: you see in Super Mario.
Speaker 2: I don't know what happens in Super Mario. I'm really sorry,
Speaker 2: but they do slide on the ice.
Speaker 1: They do? Are they having fun?
Speaker 2: No? They usually, well, it's usually if they just need
Speaker 2: to get away fast, or if it's really downhill. I mean,
Speaker 2: they seem to prefer to walk unless it's really hard
Speaker 2: going because the snow is actually quite coose and it
Speaker 2: rubs all the oil off their feathers, so they want
Speaker 2: to keep. You know, that means they've got a pream
Speaker 2: later and reoil them.
Speaker 1: Okay, I was like, where are they getting this oil?
Speaker 1: They probably barf it up from a krill pouch in
Speaker 1: their beautiful weird necks. So I looked it up for us,
Speaker 1: and thankfully, it's just from a grease bigot near their butt. No, biggie,
Speaker 1: it's at the base of their tail. It looks like
Speaker 1: a little fleshy knobber jobber. It's called a europigeal gland,
Speaker 1: but you know what, if you're close pals, please call
Speaker 1: it a preen gland.
Speaker 2: I'm waiting for some really stupid question from a friend.
Speaker 2: I'm positive.
Speaker 1: Michelle Lee wants to know. Can penguins drink seawater? Is
Speaker 1: that how they stay hydrated?
Speaker 2: Absolutely? Yeah. They eat snow and drink seawater, and they
Speaker 2: have a gland just just beneath their eyeball at the
Speaker 2: back of the bill, a lot like our kidneys, but
Speaker 2: actually functional for drinking seawater, so they can shed saline
Speaker 2: quite well without it dehydrating them. So yes, they can. Definitely,
Speaker 2: they can definitely get water from seawater, but they would,
Speaker 2: given a choice, they'd rather drink fresh or snow because
Speaker 2: it's not having to expend energy.
Speaker 1: Of getting rid of the snot. Okay, This next one
Speaker 1: is about a penguin with a donkey call and thus
Speaker 1: a very unfortunate name. Tony Olivier, first time question asker
Speaker 1: wants to know the African penguins previously known as jackass
Speaker 1: penguins are endangered and there's a project and a way
Speaker 1: to try to create a new colony to bridge the
Speaker 1: big distance between the two egs colonies. Has this ever
Speaker 1: been attempted or achieved before and is it likely to succeed?
Speaker 2: I have no idea, but it's definitely been achieved before.
Speaker 2: In Puffins on I think Egg Island up in Maine,
Speaker 2: there was a colony of puffins that were reintroduced by someone. Yes,
Speaker 2: a researcher made like dummy puffin models and started broadcasting
Speaker 2: breeding calls because there were puffins around but they weren't nesting,
Speaker 2: and managed to get them to resettle. And I gather
Speaker 2: that's now quite a successful colony.
Speaker 1: I did not know that. Did you know that the
Speaker 1: porgs in Star Wars were puffins?
Speaker 2: Yes, we actually have a camera there. Yeah, we actually
Speaker 2: have a camera that was just out a shot in that.
Speaker 2: So if you go on Seabird Watch, you can be
Speaker 2: part of Star Wars.
Speaker 1: Okay, I look this up. Side note and these scenes
Speaker 1: from the Last Jedi were filmed on Skelley mckel Michael,
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's an Irish island which is absolutely
Speaker 1: lousy with puffins, just infested with these squat, colorfully beaked,
Speaker 1: just stomach churningly pretty Atlantic puffins. They are so repulsive
Speaker 1: you just wanna, oh you want to cuddle them. So yes,
Speaker 1: Disney and Last Jedi director couldn't paint them out at
Speaker 1: the background, so they just made a new icon and
Speaker 1: a bunch of cash on porg merch. It was easier
Speaker 1: than cheating them out of the scenes. Oh, speaking of cheating,
Speaker 1: many of you patrons had questions about penguin monogamy, such
Speaker 1: as Julia Ruby, Johnstone, em Flying Squid with Goggles, Catalina
Speaker 1: and Barberu, Alisa Figueroa, Jess Lynn, Zoe, Jane, Natalie Brandt,
Speaker 1: and first time question askers Sylvia Travirio, Sam Cohen, Andrew Telvin,
Speaker 1: Julia Hayman and Emily Dix. Plus two folks sid Gopkujar
Speaker 1: and Enrique I C. Sarmiento, who saw the same nat
Speaker 1: Geo video titled home Wrecking Penguin. But this husband has
Speaker 1: come home to find his wife with another penguin. They
Speaker 1: saw this video in which two penguins nearly beat each
Speaker 1: other to death because one's partner cheated on them with
Speaker 1: the other. Is that a common occurrence?
Speaker 2: It's not common, but I've definitely seen it.
Speaker 1: Really.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely so. I mean that's classic social punishment to
Speaker 2: deter them. But yeah, yeah, wow, that's definitely.
Speaker 1: A lot of people had questions about flight and wings
Speaker 1: and flippers. They were Stephanie Bird's and a Valerie, MICHAELA. Goings,
Speaker 1: Vanessa Fray, Courtney, Ryan Corey Navis, and Ashland who wrote
Speaker 1: do penguins have flippers? Are they technically wings? Oh boy,
Speaker 1: I'm so excited for this, And then there was a
Speaker 1: hard it emoji. Troy Clarkston as well as others want
Speaker 1: to know. Have penguins always been flightless birds? Or were
Speaker 1: they at one point able to fly and then they
Speaker 1: just got better and better at swimming?
Speaker 2: Yeah? So flightlessnesses evolved several times in seabirds, and it's
Speaker 2: often the kind of offshore sea staff. Actually, in fact,
Speaker 2: we get the word penguin means great oak, which is
Speaker 2: now an extinct seabird in the northern hemisphere. Actually it
Speaker 2: means white cap white head, and so it's probably sailors
Speaker 2: that first came south saw something that they thought was
Speaker 2: a great ork.
Speaker 1: A great ox side note is a now extinct flightless
Speaker 1: bird whose numbers dwindled partly because its fluffy down plumage
Speaker 1: was prized in Europe and now there are no more
Speaker 1: great ox. So they stood nearly a meter tall, they
Speaker 1: were great, They had a grooved black beak, and they
Speaker 1: looked like a penguin, but they were not closely related.
Speaker 2: Flight listeners has evolved in seabirds several times, in cormorants
Speaker 2: in the ooks, and also in penguins. So I think
Speaker 2: the nearest the nearest modern relative is something like a pelican,
Speaker 2: and the ancestral penguin was quite big, and gradually, yeah,
Speaker 2: you got better at probably diving, and then gave up flight.
Speaker 2: I mean, there are examples of bad flyers, like cormorants
Speaker 2: are a great one. So cormorants and shags aren't good flyers,
Speaker 2: but they're quite good divers. And so for a penguin
Speaker 2: to evolve you probably have to have no predators on land,
Speaker 2: and you probably have to be quite close to your
Speaker 2: food source so that you you get better at diving,
Speaker 2: and you you know, it matters less and less that
Speaker 2: you have to either be able to fly to escape
Speaker 2: predators or that you have to be good at flying
Speaker 2: to get there, and then you probably just get better
Speaker 2: and better at diving.
Speaker 1: Any flim flam that you would want to debunk, any
Speaker 1: myths about penguins that you're so sick.
Speaker 2: Of, I'm really glad you defined flim flam that they
Speaker 2: fall over when aircraft go overhead.
Speaker 1: So it did not happen.
Speaker 2: No, they used to be. No, I don't know where
Speaker 2: it started, but yes, they don't fall over backwards and.
Speaker 1: Can't get up this plum flam. By the way, it
Speaker 1: started as stories of Royal Air Force pilots swooping over
Speaker 1: the Falkland Islands, and our penguin friends would stare up
Speaker 1: at them and crane their necks until they plopped backwards.
Speaker 1: So it was said. Now this has been bird lore
Speaker 1: for so long that one penguinologist, doctor Richard Stone, finally
Speaker 1: flew a bunch of aircraft over some king penguins in
Speaker 1: South Georgia. It varies altitudes for five weeks and narry
Speaker 1: a penguin toppled, not one. They did run away, and
Speaker 1: they seem irked understandably, like can you not ugh, no enough?
Speaker 1: What about movies with penguins? Do you have a favorite
Speaker 1: or any that are on your shit list?
Speaker 2: Ah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, really I.
Speaker 2: Want to say no comment, but I also really want
Speaker 2: to say it. So Morgan Freeman is one of my
Speaker 2: favorite humans, and yet yes, March of the Penguins is
Speaker 2: wonderful with the sound off, and it's slightly exaggerated throughout.
Speaker 2: So it's really disappointing when Morgan Freeman is exaggerating about
Speaker 2: penguins and you're like, oh, Morgan, Yeah, so March of
Speaker 2: the Penguins is absolutely one of the best. But yeah,
Speaker 2: it's just it's all kind of you know, it's very dramatized.
Speaker 2: With a sound on. It would be happy Feet. I
Speaker 2: mean it gets the behavior so well.
Speaker 1: Really, so happy Feet gets the behavior really well as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, just every now and then when they're walking in
Speaker 2: the attitude. It it's stunning. I mean, it captures something.
Speaker 2: It's like seeing you know, it's like someone doing an
Speaker 2: impression of someone famous or or your best friend. It's
Speaker 2: a lot like that. So yeah, happy Feet is really good.
Speaker 1: So enjoy March the Penguins, but know that it's kind
Speaker 1: of like David Attenburrow with a dash of Real Housewives.
Speaker 2: You absolutely don't need to exaggerate about penguins. They are
Speaker 2: badass and they are really stoic and strong and amazing.
Speaker 1: Respect a lot of people. Sarah Michelle, Josh Duncan, Meghan Johnson,
Speaker 1: Elena Clements and Charles Madeline, Uncle, Tayley Kawakami, Diane p
Speaker 1: All want to know what's happening with pebbles? What makes
Speaker 1: one pebble better than another? How do penguins decide on
Speaker 1: the best pebbles to give their meats?
Speaker 2: Lots? Is the simple answer.
Speaker 1: Okay, so some species of penguins, like Gen two's, for example,
Speaker 1: are like, if you want a bone, you better bring
Speaker 1: me a bunch of small rocks. It's like a roast ceremony,
Speaker 1: but with a bunch of small rocks.
Speaker 2: So how do they decide on it? If they can
Speaker 2: carry it and it's I mean, they tend to be
Speaker 2: of a certain size. Partly I think that's what's available,
Speaker 2: but they're definitely choosing I mean, it can't be like
Speaker 2: a stack of grain. It can't just fall down. So
Speaker 2: I mean they're they're for insulation. It's to keep the
Speaker 2: eggs and the chicks out of meltwater when it starts
Speaker 2: getting a bit sloppy. So they're like a raised stone donut.
Speaker 2: And the higher the better. I think it's not just
Speaker 2: giving them their mate, because they both do it. They
Speaker 2: both maintain the nest, but the male is usually building well,
Speaker 2: the male is building it, and then the female is
Speaker 2: usually helping. There's a lot of maintenance in between foraging trips.
Speaker 2: But yeah, pilum high, that's the secret. Pilem high and
Speaker 2: then keep your egg out of any meltwater.
Speaker 1: Oh so they're functional, they're not just like I thought.
Speaker 1: You man like this.
Speaker 2: It's a bit of both. It's good real estate. It's
Speaker 2: showing that you can provide, so that's more in the choice,
Speaker 2: and then then it's maintaining something. Then it's maintaining a nest.
Speaker 1: Some people had questions about necks knees. Tia mckinness wants
Speaker 1: to know why does a penguin's neck account for so
Speaker 1: much of its body? And Madison Nobraga and Hadley literally
Speaker 1: just wrote penguin knees. What's happening.
Speaker 2: Well, penguins do have knees, they're just tucked inside inside
Speaker 2: their body, so they look like a swan sat up
Speaker 2: right basically if you could take the flesh off.
Speaker 1: Let's not do that, okay, So if you can picture
Speaker 1: a penguin like, no neck, tiny stubby legs, right, ha,
Speaker 1: that's what you think. That's what we all think. Their
Speaker 1: knees are way the hell up there. They're tucked up
Speaker 1: and almost like up near their rib cage and then there,
Speaker 1: seemingly bodybuilder lack of a neck is actually long. Boy.
Speaker 1: Their neck goes all the way down to where their
Speaker 1: flippers start. Pretty much. Do they look like a fluffy potato, Yes,
Speaker 1: but they're like the Billie Eilish of birds. What's under
Speaker 1: there is none of our damn business.
Speaker 2: The next I'm not sure when the next are so long. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I have no idea why they've maintained that, because it
Speaker 2: really is tucked inside the body. Most of the time
Speaker 2: it's used in courtships, so anything that's kind of sexual
Speaker 2: signal is often maintained. But in the water, I mean,
Speaker 2: it's tuck right in and they look a lot more
Speaker 2: like a torpedo, but they still have a lot of
Speaker 2: dexterity in their feet, in their legs, both walking and
Speaker 2: also in the water as rudders.
Speaker 1: Oh, as rudders, So that's kind of how they maneuver
Speaker 1: so fast.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's deep.
Speaker 1: Can they dive?
Speaker 2: The record is an Emperor penguin that's about just over
Speaker 2: five hundred meters. The smallest ones little penguins in Australia
Speaker 2: might be twenty to thirty meters. Most of them in
Speaker 2: Antarctica are diving where the prey is, so that's kind
Speaker 2: of often anywhere between forty and sixty meters. Emperor's half
Speaker 2: a k that's pretty bonkous.
Speaker 1: Do they not get the bends?
Speaker 2: Well, most breath holding means you don't have a build
Speaker 2: up of nitrogen. Also, most diving animals store a lot
Speaker 2: in their muscle, and they have my globin that releases
Speaker 2: a bit more a bit slowly. But yees, a lot
Speaker 2: of diving mammals. I don't know about birds, but a
Speaker 2: lot of diving mammals do get decompression sickness over time.
Speaker 1: Really, Kylie Wilkinson wants to know are they black with
Speaker 1: white feathers or white with black feathers.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure. I think developmentally they are white with
Speaker 2: black feathers, because you can occasionally see mutations where you
Speaker 2: see a line but you don't see the black is gray.
Speaker 2: So I'm not sure. Okay, but it's amazing how many
Speaker 2: species are both black and white and that counter So
Speaker 2: that's one of the coolest things about penguins, is it.
Speaker 2: I mean, in general, everyone thinks of them as upright,
Speaker 2: and they're not. That is where they come ashore to breed,
Speaker 2: and if they can breed in water, they would. When
Speaker 2: they're in water, that's their natural element. And like cormorants,
Speaker 2: like so many seabirds, and also a lot of killer
Speaker 2: whales and things like that. This counter shading is camouflage.
Speaker 2: So if you look at them in the water from above,
Speaker 2: they're dark against a dark background, and if you look
Speaker 2: at them from underneath, they're light against the light background.
Speaker 1: Oh oh my god.
Speaker 2: Just see black and white animals everywhere, because that seems
Speaker 2: to be just a natural way to camouflage yourself in
Speaker 2: the ocean.
Speaker 1: I never even thought about that. Orcs and penguins were
Speaker 1: in the same fabulous outfit, just laying and getting slaid.
Speaker 1: But I want to think about that. The most common
Speaker 1: question I got by far Meganyounce, Nicholas Cazulis, Meghan Johnson,
Speaker 1: Nikki DeMarco, Kelly Brockington, They're a peck. Joey Tabb, Amanda Lot's,
Speaker 1: Loretta Neil, Elizabeth Kapustka, Diana Silver, and Jess Swan all
Speaker 1: have the same question, and it is why are they
Speaker 1: so cute? Why are pengins so?
Speaker 2: Thank you genuinely not comment.
Speaker 1: Do you find them cute? I know you work with them,
Speaker 1: but do you know I don't.
Speaker 2: Find respect them when I'm absolutely awesome? Okay, No they're not.
Speaker 2: They're not cute. They're wonderful.
Speaker 1: Okay, I love that distinction, but you would not patronize
Speaker 1: them to the point of calling them cute to you?
Speaker 1: Are you aware? As one listener, Julia Tolbert said, is
Speaker 1: it true that the Chinese word for penguin translates to
Speaker 1: business goose?
Speaker 2: I have no idea.
Speaker 1: I don't know, but maybe that's why we think they're
Speaker 1: Cute's because we see them in a tuxedo. But really
Speaker 1: they're just like a They're like an orca, countershaded for
Speaker 1: maximum badassery.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, wow, we need to have a completely different view
Speaker 1: of penguins. They're not cute business, they're badasses or a
Speaker 1: business goose.
Speaker 2: Oh maybe we should think of us when we have
Speaker 2: to be smart as more business goose.
Speaker 1: I think we should. Okay, y'all, I check this out
Speaker 1: and it's real. Oh lord, oh my word. If there
Speaker 1: is nothing to be happy about and you're feeling glum,
Speaker 1: just remember business goose is a thing, all right, And
Speaker 1: to be fair, the Mandarin translation can also technically mean
Speaker 1: tiptoe goose. That's also great either or tiptoe business goose.
Speaker 1: All in my life has changed. Also. Another thing that's
Speaker 1: real and I didn't know what aside to put it
Speaker 1: in was some species of penguins try to steal each
Speaker 1: other's chicks. If there's dies penguin abduction not very business.
Speaker 1: Like the last questions, I always ask what do you
Speaker 1: hate the most about penguins or your work? There's got
Speaker 1: to be something that sucks about being a penguinology email.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's always email. I crave the destruction of emails,
Speaker 2: so I can guess on with what is important.
Speaker 1: But no.
Speaker 2: There and in science short term contracts. Otherwise, there is
Speaker 2: very little that is bad about my job. So it's
Speaker 2: a tiny bit of insecurity and it's a lot about
Speaker 2: trying to do twelve months worth of admin and emails
Speaker 2: in eight months, okay, but otherwise no, I literally have
Speaker 2: the best job in the world. It's it's incredible, and
Speaker 2: there are there are a lot of times where you
Speaker 2: pinch yourself and it's nuts. It's nuts. What what main
Speaker 2: team collaborators is absolutely insane. What we get to do,
Speaker 2: and in the knowledge that we're making a difference, that
Speaker 2: is crazy. So I wish someone had told me that
Speaker 2: as a kid, because like that that is so important
Speaker 2: and now I just I genuinely cannot believe. I still
Speaker 2: I still expect someone to tap me on the shoulder
Speaker 2: and say, no, you can't do that. The gigs are.
Speaker 1: What's your favorite thing about it the.
Speaker 2: Year to year is the ability to make a difference.
Speaker 2: Then the kind of minute a minute the highs are.
Speaker 2: I mean, we get in some cases we've been to
Speaker 2: places that no one's ever been and most and a
Speaker 2: lot of them are just people where very few people
Speaker 2: have been or seen what we do. I mean, I've
Speaker 2: just got back from the South Sandwich Islands and we
Speaker 2: always have this argument and the fact that you say
Speaker 2: always have this argument in the South Sandwich islence is
Speaker 2: a little bit like saying I was on the Moon
Speaker 2: the other day and no one gets it. But yeah,
Speaker 2: we were having this argument about because you know, we
Speaker 2: don't have Google, so we were arguing and trying to
Speaker 2: calculate where the next nearest human was and was it
Speaker 2: on the space station or you know, was it on
Speaker 2: South Georgia. And so yeah, there's some truly bonkers moments
Speaker 2: like that. There's quite a few nutty moments where you
Speaker 2: pinch yourself and genuinely cannot believe you get to do this.
Speaker 1: And is there anything that you feel like people can
Speaker 1: do for penguins?
Speaker 2: The average joe absolutely eat less krill. So krill supplements
Speaker 2: are taken from Antarctica. It's actually hard to know the
Speaker 2: degree to which that's damaging antarctica. But I do not
Speaker 2: think we should be exploiting antarctica. So amiga three supplements
Speaker 2: from krill. I mean there are placebo anyway, and there
Speaker 2: was a meta analysis recently that showed they had either
Speaker 2: know or they had negative impact on humans. So please
Speaker 2: don't eat krill. Eat less krill unless you're a penguin,
Speaker 2: which case, Okay, eat more krill.
Speaker 1: I do know.
Speaker 2: I mean they can go to penguin Watch and every
Speaker 2: time they go to penguin watching click on something, they're
Speaker 2: helping us with data and protecting them. That's pretty wonderful.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for doing this. You're the world's
Speaker 1: most famous penguinologist. So ask smart penguins stupid questions because
Speaker 1: they deserve our respect. They're not cute, even though they
Speaker 1: are very adorable. So to watch more penguins and follow
Speaker 1: doctor Tom Hart's work, you can check out Twitter dot
Speaker 1: com slash Penguin Underscore Watch. They're also Penguin Underscore Watch
Speaker 1: on Instagram. Penguin Watch dot org will take you to
Speaker 1: the best video game ever. You can help scientists count
Speaker 1: business geese. They're using community science to get their counts, right.
Speaker 1: I did it last night and like animal crossing, but
Speaker 1: real animals. So there you go. You just get to
Speaker 1: look at pictures of penguins and clickity clickity click and
Speaker 1: help them count. It's the best. A link to that
Speaker 1: will be in the show notes. We are at ologies
Speaker 1: on Twitter and Instagram. I'm at Ali Ward with one
Speaker 1: L on both. Thank you to everyone again for supporting
Speaker 1: on patreon dot com slash Ologies if you want to
Speaker 1: ask questions and get some behind the scenes stuff. Ologies
Speaker 1: Merch is available at ologiesmirch dot com. That's managed by
Speaker 1: Shannonfelds and Body Dutch, two sisters who host a comedy
Speaker 1: podcast called You Are That. You can check that out
Speaker 1: if you're looking for anyone. Bleeped episodes and transcripts are
Speaker 1: at the link in the show notes, and thank you
Speaker 1: to all the Ologies transcribers and Emily White for heading
Speaker 1: that project. Thank you to Caleb Patten for bleeping episodes.
Speaker 1: Assistant editing was done by Jarrett Sleeper of the mental
Speaker 1: health podcast My Good Bad Brain. He hosts weekly live
Speaker 1: streams on Sundays at teneam Pacific with traumatologist doctor Nick
Speaker 1: Barr and those are so great, especially these days. Thanks
Speaker 1: as always to lead editor and just the nicest business
Speaker 1: ghost you you can ask for, Stephen Ray Morris, who
Speaker 1: hosts the Kitty themed per Cast and the Dino themed
Speaker 1: See Jurassic RTE podcasts. Nick Thorburn wrote and performed the
Speaker 1: theme music. He's in a great band called The Island,
Speaker 1: so do check them out. If you stick around at
Speaker 1: the end of the episode, you know I tell you
Speaker 1: a secret. This week's secret as that down on my
Speaker 1: last roller toilet paper. We got two boxes of Kleenex
Speaker 1: on standby, but at this rate, it was going to
Speaker 1: take a very long time to get any ordered, and
Speaker 1: there's none on shelves. So I did it. I got
Speaker 1: a bid dat, I ordered a bi day. It came
Speaker 1: in the mail yesterday. I spent an extra twenty nine
Speaker 1: dollars for a warm water option because I'm not about
Speaker 1: to shoot an icicle at my butt yet to be installed.
Speaker 1: Stay tuned. We're getting through this together, all right. Stay home,
Speaker 1: stay in, stay safe, Rest up. Talk to you next week.
Speaker 1: Pray by pack Aderman College Ambiology, r doo Zoology, Lithology, Technology, Meteorology, Stology, Technology, Seriology, Canology.
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