This link gives you a very good overview of the latest arguments about whether Cryptochromes, which are sensitive to magnetic fields and exist in the eyes of birds, help with their navigation. All the great and good involved in this field are quoted. I personally do not think that the quantum effects in a Cryptochrome can exist in the “noisy” high temperature environment of the eye of a bird.
Richard Nissen
editor
We know that cuckoos nest over winter in the Congo and breed in Europe. UK cuckoos arrive in the latter part of April and lay their eggs in another bird’s nest. The common host of cuckoos are Reed warblers, Meadow pipits and even non-migratory Robins. The juveniles a month later in May. The fledgling casts out the other…
The Economist have just published a letter I wrote to them regarding a recent academic article on Viking sunstones. In the following letter I put forward what I believe to be an original argument on this popular subject. I have no way of proving this theory, which puts me in good company with the scientists…
http://www.2physics.com/2012/10/avian-compass-reloaded.html Please find this interesting piece entitled The Avian Compass Reloaded by Dagomir Kaszlikowski at the Centre for Quantum Technologies, Department of Physics, National University of Singapore. Kaszlikowski talks about the the quantum effect that is required to enable the Cryptochromes in the eye of the European Robin to be sensitive to the earth’s magnetic field….
I love this little observation by James Mather… “I was on a ladder clearing the gutters end of last week, and over a period of hours heard a number of flocks of birds gathering to migrate, and I could see them heading off in V-formation. Then, at one point, low cloud closed in, but I…
There has been a recent article in the New Scientist 9 August 2014 entitled: “Songbirds really do fly south for the winter” Scientists had postulated that intercontinental migratory songbirds flew north for the summer to breed in order to escape overcrowding and intense competition in the tropics. Most of us had always though that the…
Please note that the BTO (British Trust for Ornithology) carry out a brilliant Cuckoo tracking project. We think that we need to be sure that we are clear how fledglings make the journey to their wintering grounds. As they have never been there before, how do they know how to get there? If any of…