Penguin Sweaters

I don't know if you all know this, but New Zealand has suffered a terrible oil spill from a foreign container ship "Rena." A huge portion of Eastern coastline has been affected by the oil (right where some of my family live - my sister has volunteered for clean-up duties along the beautiful Papamoa beach).

The worst part is how the wildlife is being affected.

Here is a report from the New Zealand Herald on the tragedy of the penguins:

Authorities assisting with wildlife recovery are being inundated with oiled little blue penguins.

While around 120 penguins have been rescued so far, the number of breeding pairs in the region are around 200 to 300 and the spill couldn't have come at a worse time.

It is the middle of breeding season for the nocturnal birds who are being covered in the thick tar-like oil while crossing rocks to return to their burrows.

Rebecca Bird, one of 140 field staff working as part of Maritime New Zealand's oiled wildlife recovery efforts, says it is heartbreaking to see that by rescuing an oiled bird it often means their offspring won't survive.

"We checked on the pair of little blue penguins in the 'window nest' a couple of nights ago, and the mate was oiled so we had to take him away to the recovery centre to be looked after. Then the next night we found the other penguin was oiled and had to take her away. We hope that the birds we recover will be  rehabilitated successfully, but it's heartbreaking to know that saving them means their clutch won't be reared.

In an effort to save the clutch, the team placed the eggs with another pair of penguins, but sadly the adoptive pair rejected the eggs.

Local conservation volunteer Dave Richards said some of the penguins who had lost their mate were also abandoning their nests: "They stay on their nests until they figure out their mate isn't coming back and eventually they'll go and feed."

"I never thought - it's a relatively small amount of oil - and it's already had such a devastating impact on the penguins." says Dave. "It's just heartbreaking."

Anyway, our Meghann sent us this report on those who are scrambling to save the penguins, and how people are knitting little sweaters for them:

In their oil-soaked state, the birds shouldn’t preen themselves because their feathers are contaminated. They also need help staying warm before and after rescue workers do what they can to clean them up.

So Skeinz, a knitting shop in Napier, New Zealand, put out a call for knitters to make little sweaters for penguins in need. And boy, have knitters around the world responded. One blog post from the folks at Skeinz.com ran under the headline “It’s raining jumpers.”  Another ran with the headline “We have Critical Mass” — but Skeinz is still encouraging determined knitters to send their handiwork along to “keep stocks available for the Wildlife Rescue Team to draw from if required.”

http://animaltracks.today.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/10/20/8411051-a-good-yarn-knitters-make-sweaters-for-penguins-after-oil-spill

Don't laugh at these wee guys, but here are some penguins from previous oil spills in South Africa and Australia all decked out in their protective sweaters:

Too cute for words!