The Golden Plover (Pluvialis dominica fulva) belongs to a family of
small birds that migrate from Alaska to spend the northern winter in
Hawaii.
To reach Hawaii they must fly non-stop over the ocean without resting,
because there are no islands en route, neither can they swim.
An Impossible Flight Plan
During their 88-hour journey of more than 4000 km, they beat their wings an
enormous 250,000 times without stopping. At the start, their average
weight is 200 grams, 70 grams of which is padding (fat) which serves as
fuel. It has been found that these birds consume 0.6% of their weight per
hour to produce propulsion energy and heat.
(This extremely low specific rate of fuel consumption is astonishing: modern
aircraft are orders of magnitude greater. A helicopter has a rate over 4%;
a jet plane has a rate of about 12%.)
However, over the 88-hour journey their total fuel consumption would require
82.2 grams, which is more than the 70 grams they start out with!
In spite of flying at the optimum speed for minimal fuel consumption, the
bird would not be able to reach Hawaii because it started out with too little
fat. The 70 grams of fat will be consumed after 72 hours which is only 81%
of the required flying time.
This would seem to doom the bird to a plunge into the ocean 800
km short of its destination. An analysis has been included - See Graph .
The Secret
What makes this ostensibly impossible flight possible is that the plover does
not fly alone: he flies in formation! (This is depicted by curve
F2 on the graph)
This not only saves 23% of the energy, but leaves a residual 6.8 grams of fat
as a reserve for headwinds.
Anyone who does not recognize this as the handiwork of a Master Designer must
try to answer the following questions:
1) How does the bird know the exact energy requirements?
2) How does it accumulate the exact amount of fat prior to the
journey?
3) How does the bird know the distance and the specific fuel
consumption? And,
4) How does the bird know to fly in a V-formation with other birds to
reduce the fuel consumption?
A Greater Mystery
How does the bird know the migration route? How does the bird navigate
to reach its destination efficiently?
Besides the Eastern Siberian golden plover described above, there is also the
North American golden plover (Pluvialis nominatrasse).
These birds also undertake a non-stop long distance migration flight - from
the coast of Labrador, across the Atlantic Ocean to Brazil.
The Eastern Siberian plovers follow the same route for both the outward and
return journey, but the American plovers use different routes in autumn and
spring.
On the northward leg they fly back to Canada over Central America and the
U.S.
Some further astonishing migration feats include: the Japanese snipe
(Capella hardwickii), which flies 5000 km to Tasmania; the East
Siberian spine-tailed swift (Chaetura caudacuta) that migrates from
Siberia to Tasmania; and the migration route of the American sandpiper
(Calidris melanotus) that covers 16,000 km from Alaska to Tierra del
Fuego at the southern tip of South America.
The birds' navigational abilities remain a mysterious puzzle. They have
no gyroscopes, compasses, or maps; their environmental conditions - the position
of the sun, wind direction, cloud cover, etc. - keep changing all the
time.
Especially over the ocean, a small error in direction would result in
floundering helplessly over the open water to their death. Flying over
oceans, they take into account drift, they avoid wasting energy on detours,
etc.
Extensive experiments conducting different kinds of birds to distant
locations in unknown parts of the world have resulted in their flying
unswervingly back to their eggs and young, defying any attempts to disorient
them during transport.
They possess an astonishingly mysterious navigational ability and we
have yet to discover how the operational information is decoded. We use a
special technical term to cover up our ignorance: we call it "instinct."
We can't help but be reminded of God's taunting query to Job:
Doth the hawk fly by thy wisdom, and stretch her wings toward the
south?
-Job 39:26
Truly, everything in creation declares His handiwork! Praise His Name,
indeed!
* * *
A Lesson for Ourselves
I was sharing all of this with Nan over breakfast and she - so characteristically
- pointed out that the plight of the plover is just like our
faith: we can't go the distance by ourselves alone either. We do better
together, in formation. We are admonished:
...Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves
together... - Hebrews 10:25
* * *
This "devotional" was excerpted from Werner Gitt, In
the Beginning Was Information, Christliche Literatur-Verbreitung e.V.,
Postfach Bielefeld, Germany, 1997. (Translation of Am Anfang was die
Information
, Hanssler,
Neuhhausen-Stuttgart, Germany, 1994.)
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