Scent helps Cory's shearwaters to navigate long distances over featureless oceans.
Anna Gagliardo at the University of Pisa in Italy and her team deprived eight shearwaters (Calonectris borealis; pictured) of their sense of smell by washing their nasal cavities with a zinc sulphate solution. The authors attached magnets to the heads of eight more birds to disrupt any natural magnetic sense, and used another eight not subject to sensory manipulation as controls.
All animals were tagged and released around 800 kilometres from their home colony. The control birds and seven of those carrying magnets returned to the colony within a few days. Just two of the smell-deprived birds made it home within the breeding period, and only after following long, tortuous paths. The researchers suggest that shearwaters navigate by an odour-based map, and not by geomagnetic fields.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Sea birds scent home. Nature 499, 382 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/499382a
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/499382a
