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Another great example of evolutionary wonders in birds is the albatross. They have a tendon sheath that allows them to lock their wings open. This, combined wit
by cmontella 9y ago
Another great example of evolutionary wonders in birds is the albatross. They have a tendon sheath that allows them to lock their wings open. This, combined with their giant wingspan, their relative heft (albatrosses are porkers), and some mysterious sensory mechanism and they are able to take advantage of wind gradients to perform a maneuver called "dynamic soaring", wherein the bird extracts energy from the wind. Scientists have measured the heartrate of soaring albatrosses, and found it to be not much higher than their resting heart rate. Albatrosses use this advantage to journey thousands of miles across the pacific, without landing once.
Some more info:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albatross#Morphology_and_flight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albatross#Morphology_and_fligh...
- jessriedel 9y ago> wherein the bird extracts energy from the wind. Just to be clear for others: the bird is gaining kinetic energy and/or elevation (potential energy). It's not extracting energy from the wind and converting it to chemical energy (fat/sugar).
- cmontella 9y agoRight, it still has to eat along the way :)