Which species uses stars to navigate during migration?

Which species uses stars to navigate during migration?

• A. Indigo bunting
• B. Desert ant
• C. Dung beetle
• D. Sea turtle

Answer: (A)

Stars act as a nighttime compass for some migratory animals, guiding their direction when the sun isn’t up. Indigo buntings are small migratory songbirds that travel long distances at night, and they have been shown to rely on the pattern of stars to orient themselves. In classic experiments, when the star field was rotated in a planetarium, these birds changed the direction they would normally migrate in, aligning with the altered sky. When stars aren’t visible, they lose that consistent directional cue and don’t show a fixed migratory heading, which demonstrates that celestial navigation is at work for them. The other options don’t fit this specific navigational cue. Desert ants mainly use a sun compass and landmarks to navigate on the ground; dung beetles can use celestial cues like the Milky Way for certain local movements but not for long-distance migration; sea turtles rely mainly on the Earth's magnetic field to guide their oceanic migrations.

Stars act as a nighttime compass for some migratory animals, guiding their direction when the sun isn’t up. Indigo buntings are small migratory songbirds that travel long distances at night, and they have been shown to rely on the pattern of stars to orient themselves. In classic experiments, when the star field was rotated in a planetarium, these birds changed the direction they would normally migrate in, aligning with the altered sky. When stars aren’t visible, they lose that consistent directional cue and don’t show a fixed migratory heading, which demonstrates that celestial navigation is at work for them.

The other options don’t fit this specific navigational cue. Desert ants mainly use a sun compass and landmarks to navigate on the ground; dung beetles can use celestial cues like the Milky Way for certain local movements but not for long-distance migration; sea turtles rely mainly on the Earth's magnetic field to guide their oceanic migrations.