Location, environment influence when
gentoo penguin chicks huddle
Date: February 3, 2016
Source: PLOS
Location and environmental conditions may
influence when gentoo chicks huddle in cold, wet Antarctic conditions,
according to a study published February 3, 2016 in the open-access
journal PLOS ONE by Caitlin Black from the
Many penguin species form aggregations
for conserving heat, providing protection, and other purposes. Scientists have
observed gentoo penguins aggregating during the post-guard period, a period
when the parents leave the chicks without waterproof feathers daily to go find
fish, but these aggregations have never been studied over a large spatial range
in the Antarctic. The authors of this study observed the gentoo penguin
aggregation behavior across four study sites along a latitudinal gradient. To
examine the adaptive benefit of aggregations, they observed each colony during
the post-guarding period of the 2012-2013 breeding season using time-lapse
cameras.
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