Comments on: How Turtles Use Earth’s Magnetic Field To Navigate Ocean Voyages

By: Matt B.

Matt B. — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 20:05:04 +0000

I assume they use the direction of the field to align north to south, and the angle of the field to the ground to figure out their latitude. Someone should make an electronic device that does that.

I also assume the turtles learn to calibrate their magnetic navigation using smaller-scale visual perception rather than navigating instinctively on magnetics alone (similar to how astronomers calibrate longer-range methods of determing distance using the overlap with smaller-scale methods).

By: m

Mon, 28 Feb 2011 15:24:47 +0000

LOL at Stevo.

a great question though!

Actually…i “think” that the did acclimatize to pole reversals. There was a study done with birds that do the same thing. Even though the magnetic field was reveresed, the birds tracked the sun.

turtles might do the same thing.

i bareley remember the article though, and probably destroyed the summary….but you should be able to google it.

By: Matt

Matt — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 18:32:03 +0000

Oh my, what a fascinating discovery! I wonder over the bioloical mechanisms by which they accomplish this feat and Stevo nice imaginative dialogue it gave me a laugh

By: Stevo

Stevo — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 06:35:06 +0000

Fascinating! Forgive my ignorance, but I’m wondering when this feature developed in the turtles. Would it have been since the last geomagnetic reversal? Or did they have a way to cope with such a reversal?

I can just image a family of turtles 780,000 years ago:

“All right kids, we’re going on vacation to Japan!”
“Yayyyy!”
Months later …
“Honey, I don’t think this is Japa-’”
“I know this isn’t Japan! Just give me a minute to figure it out!”
“Why don’t we just ask that dolphin over there?”
“WE’RE NOT ASKING FOR DIRECTIONS, DANG IT!!”

Wow. I need sleep.