The influence of experience in orientation: GPS tracking of homing pigeons released over the sea after directional training
2009
SUMMARY Flight experience is one of the factors that influences initial orientation
of displaced homing pigeons ( Columba livia ). Prior studies showed a
systematic dependence of initial orientation on previously flown direction.
Using GPS data loggers, this study sought to examine the effect of previous
directional training of 40 homing pigeons when they were released over the
sea, in the absence of proximal landmarks, in a direction almost perpendicular
to that of previous training flights. Our results demonstrated that previous
directional training evoked a systematic and predicted deviation from the
beeline over the sea that appeared as a compromise between the direction of
training and the direction to the loft. Pigeons were able to efficiently
correct their flight direction only once over land, where they flew
significantly slower and less directly than over the sea.
Keywords:
- Correction
- Source
- Cite
- Save
- Machine Reading By IdeaReader
19
References
8
Citations
NaN
KQI