World Penguin Day!

I'm quite excited to see that there are two days in a year dedicated to my favorite animal - penguins! Penguin Awareness Day is January 20th and World Penguin Day is tomorrow, April 25th. Based on some research I've done, World Penguin Day is a day to celebrate penguins and their quirkiness. It also marks the day the Adelie penguins migrate north from Antarctica so they can continue to hunt for food because the days in Antarctica become darker during this time. Many people celebrate this day by learning more about penguins, dressing in black and white, visiting penguins at a local zoo or aquarium, or even waddling for a bit!

During my research of World Penguin Day, I remembered a recent article calling for knitters to make pullovers for penguins in rehab after being caught in oil spills. These pullovers, or sweaters, were to keep penguins "warm and to stop them from trying to clean the toxic oil off with their beaks." A friend had posted a link to this article on my Facebook wall and a few ladies in a Facebook crafting group talked about getting together to knit or crochet some sweaters for the penguins.

At first I was excited to use my crochet skills to help out the penguins in need! But then, another friend followed up with a post pointing me to another article, "The Great Penguin Sweater Fiasco." This article explained that the hundreds of sweaters sent in by knitters and crocheters were not being used because there was an overabundance, and the penguins "were being kept in warm water and recovering under heat lamps, [which is] much less stressful for wild birds than dressing them in a cute knitted sweater." The stockpile of sweaters were being sold in gift shops as a fundraising effort. While these sweaters were in a way helping the organization with their rescue efforts, the penguins were not walking around with cute little knitted sweaters and bow ties.

What have I learned from the great penguin sweater fiasco? I learned that it's important to do your research! Project #7 in the Competent Communication Manual is Research Your Topic. I'll be keeping the sweater fiasco in mind as I use different resources to gather the facts for my speech!

Lina

Photo Credit: Adam Foster | Codefor via Compfight cc