(Photo courtesy The Rosamond Gifford Zoo)
The Rosamond Gifford Zoo shared the news that Elmer and Lima, two adult male Humboldt penguins, ‘in a committed same sex relationship,’ are now foster dads to a chick hatched earlier this month.
The same-sex foster couple are a first for the zoo, which has relied on foster parents to incubate eggs in the past. According to the zoo, Elmer and Lima, took turns incubating the egg and have been doing a wonderful job warming and feeding the chick since.
The zoo is renowned globally for its Humboldt penguin program and the zoo’s penguin colony now numbers 28 birds. The zoo has at least two breeding pairs of penguins with a history of inadvertently breaking their fertilized eggs. To give the eggs a better chance of hatching a chick, keepers may swap a dummy egg for the real one and give it to a more successful pair to incubate.
According to the zoo’s director Ted Fox not all penguin couples are capable and being good parents takes practice.
Elmer and Lima paired up this past fall for the current breeding season, built a nest and defended their territory, the zoo said. The zoo said the penguin team then decided to test their fostering capabilities.
On Dec. 23, the team determined that an egg laid by female penguin Poquita and her mate Vente had a viable embryo inside. They decided to swap it for the dummy egg and give Elmer and Lima a chance to incubate the real egg.
Zoo Director Fox went on to note that same-sex penguin pairs show that the idea of “family” is not species specific and that in many cases, non-traditional families do a wonderful job of child-rearing.
