Unnatural selection: Zoo splits up gay penguins

[caption id="attachment_314" align="alignnone" width="650" caption="Tough love: Toronto Zoo's gay African penguins, Pedro and Buddy, are to be split up because their snuggling and courtship behaviour is distracting them from preserving the species. Picture: YouTube/xcommunicatednewz"][/caption]

A SAME-SEX relationship between two African penguins at a Canadian zoo is to be broken up by keepers who want them to breed.

Pedro, 10, and Buddy, 20, have formed a close bond since their arrival at Toronto Zoo in May as part of a breeding program, the National Post reported.

"The two girls have been following them, we just have to get the boys interested in looking at them," Tom Mason, curator of birds and invertebrates at the zoo, said.

Mason said that if the penguins were not an endangered species the zoo would be happy to "let them do their thing".

Pedro and Buddy's separation will only last as long as they can inseminate their respective female partners -- while incubating eggs, the two may well be back "side by side."

Once breeding season is up, Pedro and Buddy will "probably" ditch their female partners and reunite, according to Bill Rapley, executive director for conservation, education and wildlife at the zoo.