Let’s go and knit a sweater for the penguin!

Some time ago, a netizen @Michelangelo posted a message on Xiaohongshu saying that her mentor resigned because she wanted to knit sweaters for penguins . Overnight, "knitting sweaters for penguins" became a new resignation declaration for workers.

The tutor resigned because he wanted to knit sweaters for penguins｜@Ms. Michelangelo/Xiaohongshu

Why knit sweaters for penguins? In fact, this is a tradition that has been going on for more than 20 years.

Let's start with the oil spill accident.

In 2001, a serious oil spill occurred near Phillip Island, near Melbourne, Australia. 438 of the little blue penguins living on Phillip Island were affected .

The little blue penguin ( Eudyptula minor ) is a small, blue penguin, the smallest of all penguins. They are mainly distributed along the coast of New Zealand and southern Australia, and are the only penguin that breeds in Australia.

Penguins may be small, but their eyes are sharp｜Tanya Dropbear / Wikimedia Commons

Little blue penguins spend about 80% of their lives swimming and foraging in the sea . In the non-breeding season, they can go out to sea for days or even weeks. When they must return to land, such as when breeding or raising chicks, they will go ashore at dusk and wait for their companions to waddle across the beach in groups and go home "off work". They do this to avoid natural enemies on land, such as some birds of prey and seals.

Little blue penguins returning home from get off work｜Phillipislandtourism / Wikimedia Commons

After an oil spill, the little blue penguins will try to clean the oil off their bodies with their beaks , but in the process, they can easily ingest toxic substances and even die. Therefore, when the staff send them to the wildlife clinic, they will put on small sweaters to prevent them from contacting the oil on their bodies, and then have professionals clean them.

This method of wearing sweaters to save penguins appeared in the late 1990s. Penguin sweaters played an outstanding role in this oil spill incident. Among the more than 400 penguins affected, 96% were successfully rescued with the help of sweaters .

This is how the world works. There are oil spills and people are fixing them｜penguinfoundation.org.au

In 2014, after the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported on the penguin sweater, it became popular outside of Australia, and an international public welfare activity "Knit for Nature" was launched, with specifications attached. People with good hands from all over the world lent a hand, and Phillip Island received tens of thousands of sweaters.

Tailor-made sweaters for little blue penguins must be made of wool｜Knit for Nature

It is worth mentioning that there was an old man named Alfred Date who was still knitting sweaters for little blue penguins at the age of over 100. On his 110th birthday, the Governor-General of Australia personally visited him. In May 2016, this kind old man passed away peacefully in his sleep. He was also one of the oldest people in Australia.

Do penguins need sweaters?

However, there is controversy over putting sweaters on penguins.

International Bird Rescue criticized that it is dangerous to put clothes on birds - clothes will keep the oil on the skin for a long time and prevent the evaporation of the fragrance in the oil; wearing clothes will also cause additional stress to penguins and pose a risk to their health. They proposed another rescue plan: using heat lamps to keep penguins warm to prevent them from pecking their feathers excessively, and washing penguins cleanly, so that the risk of them ingesting oil when combing their hair is greatly reduced.

Peter Dann, co-executive director of the Penguin Foundation, disagrees with such criticism. He believes that wearing sweaters for penguins is a measure that is adapted to local conditions. He said that in large-scale rescue operations, hundreds of penguins need to be washed with hot water. During the long waiting process, the penguins will peck their feathers and eat the toxic oil . Wool wool can not only prevent penguins from pecking their feathers, but also absorb oil into the wool, so that the penguins stay warm during the washing and transportation process.

Using sweaters to save penguins is not a perfect method, but this unique and creative idea has attracted people all over the world who care about animals and the environment and want to do something about it. Now, the Penguin Foundation has stockpiled enough sweaters to deal with the next possible oil spill, but they still welcome everyone to knit sweaters for penguins, just not on real penguins.

A sweater that doesn't go to waste

During the rescue process, the Penguin Foundation received a large number of sweaters that were not suitable in size, shape or material. In order to live up to people's kindness, these sweaters were worn on penguin toy souvenirs. The income from the sale of toy penguins is also used for the rehabilitation and research of penguins and other wild animals.

Penguin toy wearing a sweater | penguinfoundation.org.au

Now, the Penguin Foundation invites people from all over the world to knit sweaters for penguin toys. Because these sweaters are no longer used for penguins, the requirements are not strict - they do not need to be wool, and they can also be decorated with various patterns, buttons or other decorations.

Put on your clothes, little penguin! ｜ABC News (Australia) / youtube

Come check out the colorful little penguin sweaters!

The above pictures are from penguinfoundation.org.au

This campaign is still ongoing and if you are interested, you can mail your knitted sweater to Australia.

Knitting sweaters for penguins sounds like a wonderful fairy tale, and this method has indeed saved the lives of many penguins. I hope that one day, penguins will no longer need to wear sweaters and can live safely and freely in their homes.

It's also a little blue penguin!

Although the little blue penguin is the smallest in the entire penguin family, its influence in certain fields is not small. Linus Torvalds, the founder of Linux, was pecked by a little blue penguin at the National Zoo and Aquarium in Canberra while on vacation in Australia. Soon, Torvalds became obsessed with this cute animal and kept thinking about penguins. He was simply "dreaming of it day and night". Wild animals cannot be petted casually, so Torvalds chose the penguin Tux as the logo of Linux. There is also a programming challenge for the Linux kernel, named after the genus name of the little blue penguin, Eudyptula. Although Tux is not blue, the little blue penguin still typed out the code "Hello, World" in its own unique way.

Hello, World!｜Wikimedia Commons

Author: Brooke, Yellowtail Pollock

Editor: Calendar Girl, Mai Mai

Title image source: penguinfoundation.org.au

This article comes from GuokrNature (ID: GuokrNature)

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