How pigeons find home
“Pigeons can find their way home from hundreds of miles – an ability that fascinates scientists and has led to their use in carrying messages and even smuggling drugs,” BBC News says. “Now, researchers in Italy say they have shown how much the birds rely on one of their nostrils to ‘sniff’ their way around. The team report in the Journal of Experimental Biology that pigeons with a blocked right nostril were unable to create the ‘map of smells’ that guides them on their journey. … Previous attempts to unpick [the birds’] remarkable navigational skill, by this team as well as other researchers, revealed that as the birds sit in their lofts they learn the directions from which odours originate. The birds appear to construct a mental map of these odours, a map that is sufficiently accurate to guide them in the direction of home until they spot local landmarks.”
“Pigeons can find their way home from hundreds of miles – an ability that fascinates scientists and has led to their use in carrying messages and even smuggling drugs,” BBC News says. “Now, researchers in Italy say they have shown how much the birds rely on one of their nostrils to ‘sniff’ their way around. The team report in the Journal of Experimental Biology that pigeons with a blocked right nostril were unable to create the ‘map of smells’ that guides them on their journey. … Previous attempts to unpick [the birds’] remarkable navigational skill, by this team as well as other researchers, revealed that as the birds sit in their lofts they learn the directions from which odours originate. The birds appear to construct a mental map of these odours, a map that is sufficiently accurate to guide them in the direction of home until they spot local landmarks.”
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