Natures wonders: huge warbler migration (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, October 26, 2016, 21:11 (2948 days ago) @ David Turell

The birds cover a huge flight pattern from Turkey to Africa and back again:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/10/161026144352.htm

"Biologists at the University of Utah recently used light-weight geolocation technology to follow a species of songbird on its 10,000-kilometer migration from the Middle East to sub-Saharan Africa.

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"...the development of "geolocators" has allowed for the production of extremely light-weight tracking units. Rather than using satellites, geolocators use the amount of sunlight to infer the timing of sunset and sunrise. From this information scientists can use the time the sun rose to deduce the bird's longitude, and the length of the day to deduce latitude. Because these devices do not communicate with satellites, the size of the battery -- and hence the weight -- can be greatly reduced.

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"The study revealed that during the fall, the birds flew roughly 3,600 kilometers from Turkey into South Sudan, crossing the Middle East, Arabia and Sahara deserts. There the birds spent four months in central African wetlands before relocating 2,100 kilometers southeast to the Indian Ocean coast. In April the birds began moving back to Turkey, travelling 5,500 kilometers over the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. These movements resulted in an annual journey of over 11,000 kilometers or roughly the distance from Alaska to Chile (or roughly the distance from Utah to the tip of South America). This is the second-longest recorded migration for Great Reed Warblers ever recorded."

Comment: Note this migration pattern is very unusual. It is not a simple back and forth but makes a giant triangular circle pattern. We know how birds in general can use the magnetic field, sun position patterns, etc. but why did they decide on three directions? This is another mystery in understanding migration pattern and this is a giant one. Again the issue of God helping.