For couples who have just become parents, the most painful thing is that children often wake up many times in the middle of the night, and at this time, parents, especially mothers, have to start a fragmented sleep mode.
In contrast, in fact, the sleeping situation of Antarctic hat-banded penguins during parenting can only be described as "shattered". Because the cannibal penguin dozes off more than 10,000 times a day, each time it sleeps for an average of 4 seconds and then "wakes up", which adds up to more than 11 hours a day.
The discovery comes from the latest issue of the American journal Science, and was discovered by researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence in Germany.
According to the journal, researchers installed sensors in the skulls of 14 adult bonband penguins in the canband penguin territory on King George Island in Antarctica, and then used brain waves to detect the sleeping behavior of the canband penguins.
After 11 days of monitoring, the researchers found that hooded penguin parents go into an "extreme sleep" mode during the breeding season, as they need to protect their eggs and baby penguins in crowded, noisy penguin colonies. For this reason, the canband penguins had to resort to constant napping instead of sleep.
The researchers said the penguins looked like sleepy drivers, keeping their eyes open and closing frequently. Especially during the breeding season, they will continue to be in this state for several weeks, 24 hours a day.
If it is a human, it is believed that in such extreme cases, there is a high probability that the body functions will be damaged, but the researchers found that this is not the case with hat-banded penguins, their bodies are normal, and they can successfully complete the "parenting" task. This suggests that this extreme type of sleep can actually rejuvenate the penguin's body without damaging the body.
The study also found that the longest nap time of the canband penguins during the "parenting" process was only 34 seconds, and they continued to sleep in fragments both day and night. Moreover, the hatband penguins perform more than 600 short slow-wave sleeps per hour.
It is worth mentioning that the hatband penguin is one of the largest and heaviest penguin breeds, which can be up to 11 meter and weighs more than 40 kg. These penguins have black and white feathers, while the head and neck form a distinctive band-like pattern, hence the name Hatband Penguin.
Canband penguins usually live near the coastline of the Antarctic region, and they are the only bird that hatches eggs during the winter months. From April to August, the cannibal penguin begins its breeding season, breeding in the bitterly cold of Antarctica.
During this time, the female cannibal penguin lays an egg on the male penguin's foot and gives the egg to the male penguin to incubate, while the female penguin leaves to forage for food. Male penguins use their belly to keep their eggs warm until they hatch.
Hatband penguins are one of the most daring and aggressive, feeding on fish and plankton, they can dive in the water in search of food for up to 20 minutes and can dive to depths of up to 530 meters. When chinband penguins find fish, they can quickly catch the food and store it in their throats to swallow it again before returning to their nest.
The hatband penguin is considered one of the most representative animals of polar life. At the same time, it is also the first penguin species to be discovered and documented by humans. Today, canband penguins are still widely distributed in Antarctica and are tracked and protected to ensure their survival and reproduction.
In fact, sleeping tens of thousands of times a day is still a minority. Under normal circumstances, penguins generally sleep for about 12 hours a day. In addition, penguins sleep for a different amount of time each day, mainly affected by the season and breeding cycle.
During the breeding season, penguins are involved in hatching eggs, during which time they sleep for a shorter period of time. Male penguins hatch eggs on their feet and may engage in a special type of sleep known as monocular sleep.
Monocular sleep is when during sleep, penguins can keep one eye open and the other closed. This keeps you alert and keeps an eye out for threats around you, such as predators or other threats. This monocular sleep helps penguins stay safe in harsh environments.
In addition to sleeping in one eye, penguins also sleep in other ways, usually standing or lying down, leaning against rocks or ice. They may bury their heads in their chests or hide their mouths in their feathers to keep them warm. In this position, the penguin can rest and relax, regain strength.
It seems that in addition to humans, animals also feel tired when they take care of children. Thinking about it this way, do you feel much better?