And it’s not just fun that bubble machines bring penguins. They’re also enriching and stimulating, encouraging the birds’ natural behaviors and instincts and preventing them from getting bored.
“Animals are naturally curious, and it’s very important for them that we as a zoo give them something to make their lives more interesting and entertaining,” Ben Sanders of Zoos Victoria told the website IFLScience.
Though bubble machines aren’t the only forms of enrichment for penguins — water slides and floating platforms also help keep them occupied — countless zoos have found that bubbles are particularly favored amongst the birds.
“Our colony of over 130 birds enjoy lots of different types of enrichment, but the bubble machine is always a firm favorite,” Lorna Moffat, a penguin keeper at Edinburgh Zoo, said.
Humans, too, are fond of the bubble machines — at least in terms of watching penguins play with them — and many are surprised to learn that the birds like them so much.
“I had no idea that penguins would be so crazy about bubbles,” one person commented on a YouTube video of African penguins popping bubbles with their beaks at the Toledo Zoo.
Another person cheekily wrote that it looked like a “penguin foam party.”
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