A swarm of bees killed 63 African penguins on a beach outside Cape Town, in what the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds called a highly rare incident.
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The penguins were found dead on Friday at a colony in Simonstown, near the South African capital, the agency said in a statement.
"The deaths occurred suddenly, some time between Thursday afternoon and Friday morning." According to a CNN report, the protected birds were taken for a post-mortem, which showed all the penguins had multiple bee stings.
"After tests, we found bee stings around the penguins' eyes. There were no external physical injuries found on any of the birds. ... Many dead bees were also found at the site where the birds had died."
According to the report, the preliminary investigation found that the penguins died after being stung by Cape honey bees – a South African subspecies of the western honey bee that plays a major role in local agriculture.
The area where the incident took place is a national park and the Cape honey bees are part of the ecosystem, making the reason for the deadly swarm even more mysterious.
"This is a very rare occurrence," David Roberts, a clinical veterinarian with the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds told French news agency AFP. "We do not expect it to happen often, it's a fluke."
African penguins are native to the coasts of South Africa and Namibia. They are among the smaller penguin species, known for their irregular markings and loud voices.
The species is in sharp decline, going from a population of over a million in the early 20th century to just 55,000 in 2010 when they were declared endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and placed on its Red List.
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