The Ungulungu wild meerkat group babysitters stop foraging for food to feed the baby meerkats to thermoregulate.
Meerkats usually sun their solar panel bellies when they emerge from the burrow in the morning.
Sunning meerkats piloerect their long golden coats to trap warmth and channel heat into their dark grey skins.
On cold days very little sunning will occur as the ventral or underside of the meerkat has very little hair covering it, so to protect the exposed belly the meerkats will instead huddle or hug each other to keep warm and not stretch out and sun.
When it is colder or overcast, even after the meerkats have left their burrow for the morning they will stop foraging if there is a break in the overcast clouds and they will bask in the sunlight.
This warming up behaviour is highly predictable as can be seen in this video of the babysitting sunning meerkats, even the baby meerkats stand up to sun their tummies.
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