Aquarium Flowchart Illustrates The Complicated Romantic Relationships Between Its Penguins

Penguins are simply adorable and they seem to have a huge fanbase of people around the world. Beyond their cute looks and adorable waddles, their personalities and relationships can also be quite complex and endearing to follow.

Staff at the Sumida Aquarium in Tokyo know this all to well. In fact, they’ve created an entire flowchart to keep tabs on the relationships and breakups of the penguins in their care!

Photo: Pexels/Magda Ehlers

The flowchart is updated annually and shows how the penguins relate to one another, either in a positive or negative way.

You can see the flowchart below or by visiting their website:

Photo: Sumida Aquarium

If you’re wondering how to make sense of it, the various lines are color coded.

Ride lines mean the penguins are currently a couple.

Dark blue lines indicate a former couple.

Photo: Flickr/Jun OHWADA License: CC BY 2.0

Purple lines refer to a developing relationship where cheating could occur.

Yellow lines mean the penguins are friends.

Finally, teal lines represent two penguins who don’t get along well.

Beyond the flowchart, the aquarium has also taken to Facebook to share about the penguins’ antics and relationship changes.

In one post, they aquarium shared a photo of a group of penguins and spilled the tea on what’s going on. They said (translated):

“Many sightings of [the circled penguin’s] wife, Peach, have been reported near the site of Basil’s affair. The site is where the code on the bottom left of the photo is, and it may be a matter of time before you witness the moment of cheating…All the staff are excited about the future development.”

They also share photos of happy couple penguins that are cute to see:

To keep up with the penguins, you can see the flowchart here.

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