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African Penguins Boulder Beach Simonstown

Did you know….

African Penguin Boulders Beach Simonstown Cape Town

Penguins of this serially monogamous species spend day and night with their partners during breeding season: that’s about 20 to 30 days for courtship and egg laying, followed by two to three days for incubation. They’re together only at night during chick rearing, which can last 70 days, and during the weeks they’re molting, they may or may not see each other at all. Then they migrate to their feeding habitats over the winter from April through October. We’re not sure if they maintain any contact with their mates during that time, or if go their separate ways to sex-specific niches.

What’s peculiar is how males and females from different pairs could very well be found in similar wintering habitats: the spatial distribution of both sexes largely overlapped based on the biochemical markers in their blood cells. Females distributed over a wider area and tended to head for warmer (more northerly) waters than their partners. But overall, they didn’t head for male or female-only spots. Male and female penguins overlapped, even though partners didn’t.

So couldn’t they have just stayed together? The researchers think it has to do with timing: females stayed at sea 12 days longer than males. They leave the colony six days earlier and return six days later. A different timing of migration onset between sexes, the authors write, may cause the partners to migrate independently while at sea – and to reunite afterwards at their nest only. Why they can’t leave and come back at the same time, however, remains unclear.

That’s why the African Penguin found at Boulders Beach Simonstown Cape Town, South Africa are a must see when going on a Cape Point Tour.
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