How Do Birds Find their way?

• Birds use a few different methods to navigate while

migrating. They may use visual cues like landmarks or the
position of the sun and stars. They may also use magnetic
fields to help them orient themselves. Some scientists
believe that birds use a quantum mechanic ability to detect
magnetic fields in order to navigate.
• In many parts of the world, people can look up at certain
times of the day and see huge flocks of migrating birds
passing overhead. It has been noted by researchers and
ornithologists throughout history that birds often take the
same migratory paths year after year. Furthermore, many
of them return to the exact same locations at either end of
their migrations, spots sometimes separated by tens of
thousands of miles!
 A Bit Of Birding Background
• There are about 10,000 bird
species in the world, and nearly
20% of them are long-distance
migrants. These migratory
species typically move in a
north-south directional pattern
between their “breeding”
grounds and their “wintering”
grounds. Migration primarily
occurs due to the need to
reproduce, the availability of
food, and increased/decreased
threats of predation.
 How Do Birds Migrate?
• Using Their Common “Sense”
• Since migratory paths seem to remain the same year after year, scientists have
long believed that birds likely follow the landscape to find their migratory
destination. Visual markers, particular sounds, distinct smells, and learned social
cues may play a significant part in this process, according to ornithologists. This
type of honing ability is often called piloting. Imagine flying thousands of feet
above the ground below you; you could see rivers, forests, mountains, and natural
landmarks splayed out like a map.
• It is believed that birds can create a mental map of their migratory pattern, and
since large-scale environments don’t change that often over the course of a bird’s
lifetime, this method of navigation can be highly effective. It is speculated that
young birds may learn this mental map through social cues, namely joining its
parents in their annual migration, like a test run, before they go out on their own.
• Using everything from coastlines to superhighways, birds don’t need a map
because they’re constantly watching the life-size map laying before them.
Unfortunately, this doesn’t account for migrating at night, or in conditions where
visual and other sensory cues aren’t as effective.
 Looking Up, Rather Than Down
• For birds in those less than ideal
conditions, of when traveling over
large bodies of water or tracts of
land without discernible features,
another method has been
proposed. Some things that never
change on a yearly basis are the
orientation of the sun and stars, so
it is believed that some bird species
use celestial navigation, like sailors
of old, to find their way through the
more challenging legs of their
journey.
 Vision-Based Magnetoreception

• One of the more complicated theories to explain

avian migration involves bird species’ ability to
detect the magnetic fields of the Earth, and
subsequently follow those fields to their ultimate
destination. This ability to use “invisible” waves
was hard for some ornithologists to swallow, but it
was proposed that some bird beaks contain
magnetic particles that act as a compass. Recently,
this theory has fallen out of fashion, replaced by
the theory of vision-based magnetoreception.

• The concept of vision-based magnetoreception

means that birds can “see” magnetic fields and
align themselves with the direction of the field they
want to travel. If a bird is migrating south, it will
align with a south-facing magnetic field and be on
its way. Experiments in laboratories have actually
generated artificial “magnetic south”, and birds
moved in that direction.
 Contd.
• Presuming that this ability had something to do with sight,
researchers determined (through a rather amusing goggle
experiment) that birds require clear vision in their right eyes
in order to detect magnetic fields. The prevailing theory is
that a photochemical compass, of sorts, is responsible.

• Essentially, photoreceptors in birds eyes cause a chemical

process in the retina, which produces another type of
photochemical species that is reactive to magnetic field
strength AND direction. What this could mean is that
magnetic fields appear as different moving colors to a bird,
allowing them to follow a memorized path, making it very
difficult to get lost during their journeys to and fro.
 A Quantum Explanation?
• The last great mystery to vision-based
magnetoreception is how this sort of magnetic
field sensor can be present inside a bird’s retinal
cells. One of the most recent theories suggest
that quantum mechanics may provide the answer.
For such a detector or strength AND direction,
some mechanism would need to be in place
to amplify the relatively weak magnetic effects of
the Earth enough to be detected.
• In quantum mechanics, a radical pair consists of
two simultaneously created molecules, each with
one electron of opposing, associated spin that
makes these pairs highly sensitive to outside
forces and magnetic fields. When a specific light-
sensitive protein found in the retinal cells of birds,
cryptochrome, is exposed to certain wavelengths
of green or blue light, it can organically create
these radical pairs. Magnetoreception like this is
the latest field of quantum biology, and one that is
currently being studied around the world.
 Disturbance in migration
• there are many man-made
objects, such as radio towers
and power lines, that generate
weak magnetic fields. These
unnatural obstacles have been
known to disrupt migration
patterns, which can be
disastrous to bird populations.
Understanding precisely how
birds use these waves to
navigate may help humans
decrease their negative impact
on bird migration.