Knit sweaters for Penguins! haha

[Jenn Vanderslice]

Saw this in the news today and had to post it:
http://www.msnbc.com/local/rtlan/3898.asp

--
Http://members.tripod.com/Gwenevere
If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for
reward, then
we are a sorry lot indeed.-Albert Einstein

[Val]

Why the haha? Trying to save the lives of an endangered species
devastated by an oil spill is no joke. Oiled fairy penguins wear a
jumper in the hospital to stop them preening and ingesting the toxic oil
until they can be washed in detergent. If these tiny creatures are very
stressed, the washing has to wait until they are fit enough, then they
wear them until they are up to swimming and preening to replenish their
natural oils to waterproof their feathers again.

Take a look at http://www.penguins.org.au/photos/rehab.html and
http://www.penguins.org.au/media/f_penguin.jpg for pictures.

An email from Phillip Island Nature Park states:

<begin quote>
If you would still like to have a go at knitting a jumper, this is the
pattern. To any one living by the sea you may be able to adapt the
pattern
to fit other sea birds in your area that also can be effected by oil
spills and send them to a local wildlife organisation.

We hate to discourage people from helping out in these emergency
situations but we would not like to receive so many jumpers that they
were not of any use to us. We will keep you posted over the Internet if
and when we need more jumpers.

Thanks again for all your generous offers and we feel sure if anything
like this happened again we would be able to get enough knitting done
for all our penguins and the staff as well!

Penguin Jumper Pattern (this is very small, fairy penguins are tiny)

You Need
8 ply wool
1 pr No. 9 needles or ( 3.75)
1 set of 4 No. 11 needles or (3)
Method
Cast on 36 stitches.
K1 . P1. To the end of row.
Repeat 7 rows
Change to K2 . P2. Increase 1 stitch at end of every row 4 times. (44
stitches)
Continue till work measures 15cms.
Decrease 1 st each end of every row till 28 sts.
Decrease 1 st in middle of next row (27 sts)
Leave on needle
Make second side the same.
Using No 11 needles knit 18 stiches on each needle
K1 . P1 for 16 rows
Cast off

Stitch up sides to decreasing to 27 stitches &ndash; (opening for
flipper)
(If you are a loose knitter use smaller needles. Knitting must be firm
to
stop Penguins getting the jumper off.
<end quote>

Val

[That Funky Chick]

On Thu, 27 Apr 2000 09:51:25 +1000, Val <v...@cia.com.au> wrote:

>Penguin Jumper Pattern (this is very small, fairy penguins are tiny)

Thanks; I tried to follow the link on the original web site but couldn't
get the site for the pattern...

-Bertha

[Elizabeth Naime]

Val (v...@cia.com.au) wrote:
> Why the haha? Trying to save the lives of an endangered species
> devastated by an oil spill is no joke. Oiled fairy penguins wear a

Indeed it is not, but, knitted jumpers for fairy penguins, you have to
admit it is funny -- a funny phrase even before you know what it is
talking about, and a funny image to think of a tiny penguin in a knit
penguin-sweater! It also happens to be a very serious need, but surely we
can still smile about it at the same time.

Elizabeth
Who laughs at very serious things...

[KDLark]

My daughter is a Pittsburgh Penguins fan (ice hockey team, for the un-infomed)
and she says she'd be very glad to knit their star player Jaromir Jagr a
"jumper" (sweater) any day, if he'd pick it up personally...

Katrina L.

[Amymarissa]

Katrina wrote:

Go Pens! And Jagr is a sweety, isn't he?

Amy in PA- the side of the state cheering for the Pittsburgh Penguins

[Nicholas and Roberta Earley]

These little guys of our shores need all our help with out the ha ha's, and
probably a lot more spunkier than Janomir jagr.

Amymarissa <amyma...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:3908ac60...@news.stargate.net...