Arctic Tern cooled off for six weeks and began its return journey.
By Rakesh Agrawal
While humans fly in fully equipped and well-guided aircrafts, our feathered friends had tiny radars fitted into their brains, guiding them every nook and corner of our earth; a fact proved once again by Arctic Tern (Sterna paradisaea), a tiny seabird that has just set a new record for flying an incredible journey of flies 96,000km (about 60,000 miles), the longest ever migration flight recorded on June, 7.
It flew from Northumberland in the UK to the Weddell Sea in Antarctica and also returned, breaking the previous record by 5,000 km, also set by another Arctic Tern from the Netherlands.
Researchers from Newcastle University fitted 29 birds with electronic geolocators to track their migration route over and these tiny and almost weightless creatures as a bird weighs just 100g didn’t frustrate the researchers as they dutifully returned to Farne Island on the Northumberland coast this spring.
They followed the route to Antarctica via the west coast of Africa and then crossed the South Indian Ocean before finally reaching its destination four months later, beginning their journey on July, 25 last year, arriving at the tip of South Africa exactly one month later. Then, they enjoyed the autumn and spent most of October over the Indian Ocean and finally moved to the second stage on the coast of Antarctica. It finally travelled along the edge of the Antarctic continent between 15 November and 3 February, arriving at the Weddell Sea.
There they cooled off for six weeks and began its return journey, arriving in South Africa on April 4, 2016 and finally back to Farne Island a month later, on May, 5.
IFL Science notes that although scientists knew that the sea birds make the titanic trip from the northern hemisphere to the southern, and back again every year, this is the record set up by them.
The British media citadel, the BBC is also thrilled as this research was the part of its program Spring Watch and was carried out by scientists at the University of Newcastle, which charts the fortunes of native British wildlife. And the researchers after tagging 29 birds with tine geolocators in the Farne Islands waited eagerly for their return and Terns didn’t disappoint them!
This Farne Islands, located off the coast of Northumberland in northern England, is a haven for birds and along with 2,000 pairs of Arctic terns that breed there; it also hosts around 23 other species of sea birds, and in incredible numbers.
Naturally, Terns have incredible sense of direction as they returned to their native land, very much like most of us return after roaming around the world!