Seabirds suffer ‘jet lag’ that can send them off course, study finds

The study, published in the journal Science, provides some of the strongest evidence yet that seabirds rely on a sun compass to navigate vast distances, and that disruptions to their internal body clocks can affect their ability to maintain an accurate course.

The research was led by scientists from the University of Oxford, with contributions from University of Liverpool avian ecologists, Dr Ollie Padget and Dr Joe Wynn.

They contributed seabird tracking data collected over many years and helped develop the study’s central research question about how internal body clocks influence navigation.

The research team analysed two decades of GPS tracking data from 1,045 Manx shearwaters (Puffinus puffinus), covering 3,688 foraging trips across the Atlantic.

Manx shearwaters breed on islands off the western coasts of the UK and Ireland, regularly travelling hundreds of kilometres out to sea in search of food.

The findings suggest that the birds’ internal body clocks can fall out of sync with local solar time, in a similar way to the disruption that causes jet lag in humans.

Many animals, including birds, use the sun as a navigational aid. However, because the sun moves across the sky throughout the day, they rely on an accurate internal clock to interpret its position and maintain their direction of travel.

The team compared the observed changes in flight direction with those predicted from the birds’ movements and the changing position of the sun using statistical models.

The results supported the theory that disruption to the birds’ internal clocks affects their ability to navigate using the sun. This explanation also fitted the tracking data better than an alternative theory based on changes in the Earth’s magnetic field.

Dr Joe Wynn, a University of Liverpool/1851 Research Fellow, said: “These findings provide fascinating new insight into how seabirds navigate during long-distance flights. This study shows the value of long-term GPS data, particularly when answering fundamental questions about animal navigation.”

Dr Ollie Padget, Royal Society University Research Fellow and Proleptic Lecturer at the University of Liverpool, added: “Seabirds are among nature’s most accomplished navigators, routinely travelling thousands of miles on foraging trips during the breeding season. This study provides fascinating evidence that their internal clocks can become misaligned with local solar time, affecting how they interpret the sun’s position and potentially causing them to veer off course.”

The paper, ‘Rapid longitudinal flights cause time-shifts and sun compass error’ (DOI: 10.1126/science.adz2542), was published in the journal Science.

Images credit: Dr Joe Wynn