Long time, no penguins

[gridlore]

I guess an alarm clock and a fresh pot of coffee just won't do it.

To wake up a penguin, just step on its foot

Only recently did people learn how much pressure it takes to rouse a sleeping penguin. Gérard Dewasmes and Frédéric Telliez, of l'Université de Picardie Jules Verne in Amiens, lay claim to the discovery.

Dewasmes and Telliez went to the Antarctic, where they tiptoed up to nearly a dozen dozing King penguins. Their study, published in the Journal of Sleep Research, is an eye-opener for anyone who dreams of becoming expert in the fine details of bird arousal.

Very few scientists had even ventured to prod penguins, measuring how much or little pain or noise would induce a rise-and-shine response. Dewasmes and Telliez sought a subtler kind of knowledge, and took a gingerly approach. Their study explains, albeit politely, that earlier studies were sloppy and imprecise.

In the summer of 1998, Dewasmes and Telliez examined King penguins breeding at the Baie du Marin colony on Possession Island in the Crozet Archipelago. This involved a certain amount of uncertainty. "It was impossible to distinguish among the selected birds," they confide, adding that "it was also impossible to differentiate the sex of the selected birds since this can be determined only when they sing".

Sometimes they used a mechanical contraption that applied pressure to sleeping penguins' backs. Other times, they placed small calibrated weights on to the feet of snoozing penguins. For consistency, Dewasmes and Telliez devised a standard way to decide whether a penguin was asleep or awake: "An arousal began by eye opening to scan the environment. Systematically, the bird next lifted its head to perceive the origin of the disturbance. Locating the experimenter, it then escaped more or less rapidly."

This really sounds like something they cooked up while either really desperate or really stoned.

I want to see this "mechanical contraption" designed to poke a penguin.