Abstract
Studies on how visitors affect penguins in human care report a mixture of negative, neutral, and positive impacts on behavior and physiology. Swimming is a highly motivated behavior that may promote positive welfare in penguins. We investigated how visitor crowd size, composition, and noise levels impact pool use in a mixed-species colony housing king (Aptenodytes patagonicus; n = 20), gentoo (Pygoscelis papua; n = 14), and southern rockhopper (Eudyptes chrysocome; n = 24) penguins. We used video and sound loggers to record if penguins were on land or in water, the number of human adults and children present, and noise levels using 5-minute scan samples from 09:00-15:00 over 36 continuous days. Data were analyzed using linear mixed models with proportion of penguins in the water as the dependent variable and crowd size, composition, and noise levels in A-weighted (dBA) and C-weighted (dBC) scales as independent variables. Crowd size was positively associated with pool use in gentoo penguins. Crowd composition did not predict pool use in any species. Noise levels in dBA, which is adjusted to the higher frequencies of human hearing, positively predicted pool use in southern rockhopper penguins. Noise levels in dBC, which captures lower frequencies, did not predict pool use in any species. No evidence of negative visitor effects was observed. Instead, these results suggest visitors are a neutral stimulus to king penguins and may be enriching to gentoo and southern rockhopper penguins.
Highlights
The daily presence of visitors is one of the many factors that influence the lives and wellbeing of animals in human care
Pool use was positively associated with crowd size (Figure 2) but not composition or noise levels in either dBA or dBC
Pool use in southern rockhopper penguins was not significantly associated with crowd size, crowd composition, or noise levels in dBC, but there was a positive effect of noise levels in dBA on pool use (Figure 3)
Summary
The daily presence of visitors is one of the many factors that influence the lives and wellbeing of animals in human care. This study showed little penguins (Eudyptula minor) hid behind vegetation, spent little time swimming, and engaged in more frequent aggression, huddling, and vigilant behaviors when the zoo was open compared to closed (Chiew et al, 2019; Sherwen et al, 2015) These differences in behavior appeared to be reactions to guest proximity, as a barrier moving guests 2 m away from the edge of their pools returned activity patterns to levels observed when the zoo was closed (Chiew et al, 2019). Gentoo penguins showed increased pool use and behavioral diversity with higher visitor numbers (Collins et al, 2016)
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