I am posting this out of sheer cuteness! I know I have a lot of readers that knit, so i'm sure you can appreciate this. In January 2000, there was an oil spill in Australia that threatened Little penguins, or Fairy Penguins, lives. The oil reduced their natural insulation, and when they tried to preen they were poisoning themselves by ingesting the oil. Then came Penguin Jumpers Project, and 15,000 tiny sweaters were hand knit, by knitters around the world, for the penguins! You can read more about that here and here, but now for more cute pictures!
Oh, and they required that all the penguin sweaters be wool, because they needed to be insulated. Sigh... don't you just love wool? ;)
ETA: Another interesting wool fact in this story, is that salt water causes wool to break down faster. As these penguins were recovering and getting better, their sweaters were breaking down and falling off of them, in perfect timing. Now I don't know if acrylic yarn would have fallen off of them in the same timing or not, but I do know that the ocean is better off with bits of biodegradable natural wool, than acrylic!
20 comments:
OMG! That is totally adorable!
This is just awesome, I am passing it on to the owner of our wool store here in town
Too cute!
Okay, the pictures are adorable and I just love that someone thought of this. What a cool story!
just waaaayyyy to cute. Must link this from my Facebook site!!
This is the most inspiring story that I have heard in awhile! Bless those knitters hands, and I must say... they made them rather fashionably colored and stylish!! ;)
I can't wait to show this story to my dd. She loves penguins.
I love that people put stripes into their sweaters, too - those penguins look like they're all set for college!
What fashionable penguins! That would have been a sight to see.
According to the local aquarium it's National Penguin Awareness Day today. I thought it was cool you posted this :)
Really? I didn't know that, so really great timing on my part!
My 11 year old was pleased to hear that they breakdown in the water. She was worried that they would felt more and shrink, and the penguins would say, "aaagghhh, too tight!"
LOL!
the oil spill in australia was years ago. more than 5 years. there are no penguins needing jumpers in australia. save your time and money. the national park just throws them out now if they are sent as they are a nuisance.
Anonymous, If you read my post, you would see that this took place in 2000, 11 years ago. Nowhere in my post did I imply that sweaters were needed, just pointing out a cute story in history.
Also, you may want to check your facts about the sweaters. Though it is true that they no longer need them for the penguins themselves, they certainly do not throw them out. They put them on stuffed animals & sell them. All proceeds from the sale of these jumpers go to the 'Rehab centre' for the treatment of injured penguins and other wildlife.
http://shop.penguins.org.au/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=garden_flypage.tpl&product_id=55&category_id=8&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=6
what a great wee story, thank you for sharing...
So cute! Thanks for sharing!
I follow your blog and love all the fun ideas...I'm a wool addict now!
I'm one of the 500 on facebook too!
Hi, Because I am an Aussie this
post made me smile brightly.
That I haven't seen the pictures
before surprises me.
Glad to know that so many talented
wool knitters happily got involved
for such a special cause makes
me smile too.
Thanks for sharing,
Sue
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