Penguins chasing a butterfly

A lovely antidote to Monday morning stress! The only part about this that's a bummer? These wonderful, wild critters are stuck in a zoo.

Video link: Humboldt Penguins chasing a butterfly at the Philadelphia Zoo
[Submitterated by voightkamff, video by Marty McGuire]

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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Anonymous

um, those of galapagos penguins, they live in a warm climate.
JasonsRobot

That’s almost as adorable as a pod of killer whales chasing a penguin.
ashabot

I’m with you in sentiment, Xeni. Zoos are prisons, even if gilded cages. These penguins are doing pretty good in spite of all that. Now elephants? They like a 100 mile stroll before breakfast. To put them in a zoo or circus is unconscionable.
Jack

I want to make a “Sound of Thunder” or Juggalo joke, but can’t. This is too cute to be cynical!
braininavat

I liked that one penguin towards the end flapping its flightless wings as it observed the butterfly getting away.
- Felton
  
  I wonder if, deep down, all penguins wish for wings that work.
drewstarr

The only part about this that’s a bummer? That Xeni doesn’t seem to know about the habitat and species saving research and fundraising that goes on for these wonderful critters at said zoos.

The New England Aquarium in Boston has a fantastic penguin habitat as one of the centerpieces to their exhibits. They have an led flashlight with a fish-shaped filter mounted on the side of one of their aquatic tanks. I’m not the only adult who waits his turn behind the kids playing with it. It’s exactly analogous to a laser pen and a cat.
Anonymous

I am quite certain that zoos are one of (if not the)single biggest contributing factor towards the generation of conservation dollars in the world. Not to mention the multitudes of biologists, conservationists, etc that were inspired to enter the field due to a love of animals that started at thier local zoo.
adamnvillani

Life in the wild:

1. Try all day to find food. If not successful, starve to death.

2. Try all day not to get eaten by something bigger. If not successful, get violently ripped apart and eaten.

As long as you’re keeping animals in a reasonably naturalistic environment, their lives are almost always better off in a zoo. Plus, there’s the species conservation and breeding work, and the outreach and education for the public.

What have you got against zoos, Xeni?
Anonymous

So.. shinedown had it wrong then? It wasn’t a crow?
jenjen

I tend to think of zoo animals as martyrs to their race. Yes, they have a relatively safe life in the zoo, but their instincts are also thwarted. The penguins (not sure what species) at our local exhibit show classic stereotyped behavior of animals going nuts.
Anonymous

Ahhhhh! Too cute! I can’t take it!
GlenBlank

Penguin wings do work.

They’re not “flightless birds” – they just do their flying underwater.
Anonymous

It’s Tux…the zoo staff must’ve confiscated his butterfly swatter!!!
http://www.clker.com/cliparts/d/d/5/3/12178627441009240201ben_Tux_butterfly_killer.svg.med.png
alllie

There are so few butterflies anymore that I almost think they should be protected species.
zizzybaloobah

Actually many penguins, including these, DO NOT live in cold, snowy habitats as most people assume. Penguins seeing butterflies in the wild is not out of the question.
Robbo

Teh cute penguins chase-ed teh flutterby.
Teh peoples sez “Oooo” and “Awwww”.
Teh peoples with a cameras go aways.
Teh penguins eat teh flutterby.
Teh flutterby sez “Owwwww.”
waltbosz

Not as cute as the penguins, but here is a video of my dog chasing butterflies: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYUaab7A5a0
IronEdithKidd

This video reminds me of watching my cats chase a moth. Only, the cats can jump. The intensity of the chase and the laser-tight focus on the flying critter is nearly identical.
Anonymous

The only thing we learn from zoos is how inhumane and selfish human beings are.

The research is inherently flawed – no animal in captivity can behave like a free-living animal.

Further, they’ve evolved over millions of years to live in their environments, and are quite suited to it. It’s ludicrous to think that we’re providing something ‘better’ for them.

Most of these arguments were also used to justify human captivity. “It’s better for them.” “I’d rather be a slave in their position than blah blah blah.”

This all sidesteps the point: we aren’t them, and captivity does not trump freedom. We abolished human slavery for this reason, and hopefully one day this will occur for non-human animals.

Xeni has the right attitude, and we should be questioning the dominating attitudes that are so embedded in our psyches.

- Vegan Dave
- JaxS
  
  Humans are a part of nature. Our tendency to capture and domesticate other species for our own use, pleasure and benefit is therefore perfectly natural and to attempt to deny our natural instinct would be wrong…so wrong. Like trying to stop a penguin from chasing a butterfly.
- Anonymous
  
  “This all sidesteps the point: we aren’t them, and captivity does not trump freedom. We abolished human slavery for this reason, and hopefully one day this will occur for non-human animals.”
  
  I’m pretty sure the rape, murder, and forced manual labor until they died was why slavery was abolished; not to mention the slave trade itself.
moniker42

Penguins have always been my favorite zoo type animal.
jonobo

Anybody realizes the Real-World-Similarity?

Penguin = Linux-Logo.
Butterfly = Windows-Logo.

See for yourself:
http://is.gd/eugy7
lava

Ricco? Time for the dynamite.
- TimDrew
  
  “Remember: Cute and Cuddly, boys… Cute – And – Cuddly…”
wylkyn

Not only do they live in a zoo, but they more than likely don’t understand or give a crap. Humans love to agonize over issues that mean nothing to non-humans.
- Mark Dow
  
  And human are delighted by recognizing issues that mean something to non-humans, like chasing a butterfly.
LightningRose

I bet they’re trying to eat it.
Lobster

If they were wild, would they ever see a butterfly?
- Brainspore
  
  Humboldt penguins are native to South America so I’d guess “yes they would.”
Donald Petersen

Perhaps the penguins think of themselves as the cold-hearted killer Raptors of the Frozen South, their singleminded bloodthirst matched only by their goddamned inability to hop more than an inch off the ground. Is the butterfly screaming in mortal terror? Or mocking the flightless, dignity-free predators?

You ask me, the insect doesn’t seem all that concerned, but don’t be fooled by the cuteness: those tuxedoed murderers would snap at the testes of an angel, if they could only reach. Their dreams are filled with rent flesh, spilled blood, stepladders, stilts, and rented gyrocopters.
Ugly Canuck

Petersen is on to something.
Don’t anybody fool themselves, by thinking that penguins are not formidable predators, simply because they don’t come after us, and because of the difficulty – the great difficulty – of observing them while they hunt their prey.
- Boba Fett Diop
  
  And the tuxedo pattern is actually the key to their secret weapon: withering disdain. Seriously, they can stun a herring at ten meters, and do it faster than a Maitre d’ can tell you your table isn’t ready yet.
  - Brainspore
    
    So that’s where James Bond got the idea! Classy but deadly.
IWood

Life outside the zoo most likely consists of struggling to find food and being eaten by seals. I think they’re probably enjoying chasing butterflies and being well-fed.
erratic

even though I knew there was going to be a butterfly in the video, my first perception was that it was a little fish flopping around. probably triggered a pretty basic instinct in the penguins to pursue it.
pidg

No butterflies to chase in the Antarctic…

…yet.
- Anonymous
  
  Why does everyone think penguins only come from the Antarctic? Humboldt penguins come from the top half of Chile and their distribution almost reaches the equator.
Boondocker

I love that the ubiquity of portable cameras makes it possible for me to see things like this.
gobo

“These wonderful, wild critters are stuck in a zoo.”

…where they’re fed tasty penguin food regularly, receive excellent medical care, get to play and swim and get lots of mental stimulation, can breed freely, and chase butterflies. Sounds great to me.
politeruin

You have your very own number
They dress your cage in its nature
Once you roared now you just grunt lame
Pace around pathetic pound games

Wanna get out won’t miss you sensaround
To carry your own dead to swing your tyre tricks
Wanna get out in here you’re bred dead quick
For the outside
The small black flowers that grow in the sky

They drag sticks along your walls
Harvest your ovaries dead mothers crawl
Here comes warden, Christ, temple, elder
Environment not yours you see through it all

Wanna get out won’t miss you sensaround
To carry your own dead to swing your tyre tricks
Wanna get out here you’re bred dead quick
For the outside
The small black flowers that grow in the sky

Here chewing your tail is joy