I’ve got a confession to make. At times I park my car, go into a store, and when I come out I have to use my key fob to beep my way back to my car. I can’t tell you how many cars I lost before I bought a car with an electric key fob. That is why I have always been amazed at how animals can migrate thousands of miles and find there way back to the same locations months and years later.
Recently a new study from the University of North Carolina thinks it has unlocked the secret of the Loggerhead Sea Turtle’s migration.
The BBC reported “although several species of turtles are known to use magnetic cues to determine latitude, it was believed that this wasn't possible for longitude. However, the loggerhead turtles have managed to surprise researchers by developing a method that involves using the strength and angle of the Earth's magnetic field.
Nathan Putman, the lead author of the research, emphasized that "the most difficult part of open-sea navigation is determining longitude or east-west position".
"It took human navigators centuries to figure out how to determine longitude on their long-distance voyages."
Loggerhead hatchlings, however, are able to manage this feat as soon as they reach the sea from their nests.
On reaching the sea, the hatchlings are able to establish the correct course to the open ocean. The young loggerheads then spend several years successfully navigating complex migratory routes over thousands of miles of ocean.
To carry out the research loggerhead hatchlings from Florida were placed in circular water containers and tethered to electronic tracking systems to monitor their swimming direction. The hatchlings were then exposed to magnetic fields that replicated the fields they would come across in two locations on the same latitude but different longitude along their migratory route. The turtles reacted to each magnetic field by swimming in the directions that would, in the real location, take them along their circular migratory route. The researchers say this shows that the hatchlings are able to determine longitude-using information from the magnetic field.
"Thus, turtles can determine longitudinal position by using pairings of intensity and inclination angle as an X, Y coordinate system.”
Nathan Putman’s collogue, Dr Kenneth Lohmann said “This not only solves a long-standing mystery of animal behaviour but may also be useful in sea turtle conservation”
If you want to learn more about Loggerhead (and other) Sea Turtles, stop into Scuba Emporium and ask us about our Sea Turtle Awareness Specialty Program.
No comments:
Post a Comment