Rethink of birds' internal compass

To:
Subject:	Rethink of birds' internal compass
From:	Andrew Taylor <>
Date:	Thu, 13 May 2004 20:05:05 +1000

On Thu, May 13, 2004 at 07:09:04PM +1000, Stephen Selden wrote:
> MIGRATING birds may get their internal compass through a chemical reaction
> induced by the Earth's magnetic compass rather than through magnetic
> material in their beaks as the conventional theory holds.

I didn't know about magneto-receptors in birds beaks, but a quick google
turned up.

Ultrastructural Analysis of a Putative Magnetoreceptor in the Beak of
Homing Pigeons, Fleissner et al.
http://www.geophysik.uni-muenchen.de/Institute/People/IndividualHPs/michael/pdfs/JCompNeurol2003.pdf

More than I wanted to know, but the bits I have (can) read are interesting.
Andrew

--------------------------------------------
Birding-Aus is now on the Web at
www.birding-aus.org
--------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message 'unsubscribe
birding-aus' (no quotes, no Subject line)
to

<Prev in Thread]	Current Thread	[Next in Thread>
Rethink of birds' internal compass, Andrew Taylor <= Rethink of birds' internal compass, knightl

Previous by Date:	Wintering birds arrive in SE Melbourne, menorris
Next by Date:	Unusual plumage Little Pied Cormorant, Tom Tarrant
Previous by Thread:	Wintering birds arrive in SE Melbourne, menorris
Next by Thread:	Rethink of birds' internal compass, knightl
Indexes:	[Date] [Thread] [Top] [All Lists]

The University of NSW School of Computer and Engineering takes no responsibility for the contents of this archive. It is purely a compilation of material sent by many people to the birding-aus mailing list. It has not been checked for accuracy nor its content verified in any way. If you wish to get material removed from the archive or have other queries about the archive e-mail Andrew Taylor at this address: andrewt@cse.unsw.EDU.AU