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Memories Can Be Injected and Survive Amputation and Metamorphosis
There has always been huge uncertainty as to how migrating animals learn where to go. The cuckoo is a perfect example, as the newly hatched birds must travel from Europe to The Congo Basin for the winter, but how do they know the way (as their parents departed sometime before and they travel on their…
The long Way (excerpt) by Bernard Moitessier
Bernard Moitessier sailed single handed around the world in 1969 and published his accounts of this trip in 1971 in the book “The long Way”. This description comes from this book. Moitessier was a very seasoned sailor when he undertook the single handed round the world challenge in 1969. He opted out of the race…
Annual Conference of Dowsers on Animal Navigation
In September 2015 I was asked to give a workshop at the Annual Conference of Dowsers on Animal Navigation. Of course I talked about how animals, including birds, navigate and all the outstanding questions that remain on how they do it. Those who came to my presentation were some of the best dowsers in the…
Elephant Seals
Elephant seals (sea elephants) are large, oceangoing seals in the genus Mirounga. There are two species: the northern elephant seal (M. angustirostris) and the southern elephant seal (M. leonina). Both were hunted to the brink of extinction by the end of the 19th century, but numbers have since recovered. The northern elephant seal, somewhat smaller than its southern relative, ranges over the Pacific coast of the U.S., Canada and Mexico….
Another idea
I am fascinated in Animal Migration. I have attended very learned arguments about this: they have found that birds have magnets in their beaks for instance. But as you investigate these arguments they just do not work right. For successful migration you need to know when to go and where to go. Terns for instance…
The hippocampus of rats
Prof Kate Jeffery has done some very interesting work on how the hippocampus of rats processes navigational information. Scientists are clear that the hippocampus is critical for navigation but believe that it is only one part of a larger system that has many functions including recognising landmarks, computing distances and directions etc. and forming memories….