It looks like humans are not alone when it comes to mooching off free food from their parents. It turns out that Galapagos penguins are very much alike to humans.
Galapagos penguins do solicit food from their parents too even after they are old enough to get food for themselves, a new study stated. However, unlike human parents, Galapagos parents are only willing to give their big kids food like fish when there is plenty of it, National Geographic reported. Parents only give when they have extra resources. When the baby Galapagos are almost 60 days old, they mature into independent fledglings. Though not like many other penguins species, the Galapagos ones stay close to their parents to learn hunting for food.
The study, which was published online on March 13 in "The Wilson Journal of Ornithology", also stated that the kind of relationship they found was rather normal but not every Galapagos penguin parents do it. There are also penguin parents that do not recognize their kids, hence, no free food. The research team was led by University of Washington biology professor Dee Boersma, according to Science Daily.
"Through field seasons over the years when we were observing penguin behavior in the Galapagos Islands, we saw these isolated instances of adults feeding individuals who had obviously fledged and left the nest," said Boersma. After collecting enough field observations, they concluded that post-fledging parental care is a normal and a part of Galapagos penguin behavior.
Many seabird species' parents do continue to give their offspring food even after fledging. However, those times are only very limited. There are only 18 penguin species that do this and Galapagos penguins are now the second penguin species, after Gentoo penguins, to do post-fledging parental care.
The behavior might be a result of adapting to situations, said professor Dee Boersma. She does not expect to find other seabirds to do the same. But since there is less and less food from the sea due to climate change, the home where penguins find food is changing, thus they will too.
