{"id":55309,"date":"2024-05-21T11:03:24","date_gmt":"2024-05-21T11:03:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/05\/21\/see-how-hummingbirds-sneak-through-small-spaces\/"},"modified":"2024-05-21T11:03:24","modified_gmt":"2024-05-21T11:03:24","slug":"see-how-hummingbirds-sneak-through-small-spaces","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/05\/21\/see-how-hummingbirds-sneak-through-small-spaces\/","title":{"rendered":"See how hummingbirds sneak through small spaces"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1440\" height=\"810\" src=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/1440_WT_banner_border_thick.png?fit=1440,810&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"See how hummingbirds sneak through small spaces\" title=\"See how hummingbirds sneak through small spaces\" \/><\/div><p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<p>Hummingbird wings are amazing. They can flap dozens of times per second. And they can twist in ways that let hummingbirds fly upside down and backwards. But these wings also have one big limitation. They can\u2019t bend as hummingbirds fly. That means hummingbirds shouldn\u2019t be able to slip through gaps narrower than their wingspan. Yet somehow, they do.<\/p>\n<p>Videos of Anna\u2019s hummingbirds (<em>Calypte anna<\/em>) have now revealed <a href=\"https:\/\/journals.biologists.com\/jeb\/article-lookup\/doi\/10.1242\/jeb.245643\" rel=\"noopener\">how the tiny birds pull this off<\/a>. The discovery \u201cwas a shocking revelation,\u201d says Robert Dudley. He\u2019s a physiologist at the University of California, Berkeley. He and his colleagues shared their findings November 9. The work appeared in <em>Journal of Experimental Biology<\/em>.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1440\" height=\"1440\" src=\"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/1440_WT_Hummingbirds-Title-Panel.png\" alt=\"How hummingbirds flutter through small spaces. Written by Maria Temming. Illustrated by JoAnna Wendel. Image: A hummingbird with a magenta head, white body and some green on its wings and tail flies past a field of purple lavender flowers under a blue sky. \" class=\"wp-image-3139765\" \/><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1030\" height=\"1207\" src=\"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/1030_WT_Hummingbirds-Panel_1.png\" alt=\"Hummingbirds are tiny acrobats. They can fly backwards and even zip around upside-down. Image: Two hummingbirds fly through a blue sky with a tree branch in the background. One hummingbird with magenta, green and white feathers is flying upside-down. He is looking up at another hummingbird with green and white feathers and saying, \u201cLook what I can do!\u201d\" class=\"wp-image-3139762\" \/><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1030\" height=\"1448\" src=\"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/1030_WT_Hummingbirds-Panel_2.png\" alt=\"While hummers can do many tricks, one thing they can\u2019t do is bend their wings as they fly. That\u2019s what allows other birds to squeeze through tight spaces. Image: A pigeon flies through two forked branches of a tree by folding its wings close to its body. It makes a \u201cfwoosh!\u201d noise as it soars through. A hummingbird sits on a nearby branch in the forest, watching the pigeon. The hummingbird\u2019s thought bubble says, \u201cHow is she doing that??\u201d Text (below image): So it\u2019s been a mystery just how hummingbirds fit through gaps between branches that are smaller than their wingspans. \" class=\"wp-image-3139763\" \/><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/1030_WT_Hummingbirds-Panel_3.png\" alt=\"To find out, researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, trained four hummers to fly between two feeders inside an arena. Image: A diagram shows the layout of a two-roomed arena. In the front room, a hummingbird drinks from a fake yellow flower on the wall. The hummingbird is saying, \u201cYum, yum, yum.\u201d Two cameras watch the hummingbird from the floor and another wall of this room. A third wall of the room has a small hole in it. The hummingbird can fly through this hole to reach the second room of the arena, which has its own fake flower that the hummingbird can drink from. Text (below image): The feeders were separated by a wall with a hole as wide or narrower than the hummingbirds\u2019 wingspan. \" class=\"wp-image-3139758\" width=\"680\" height=\"826\" \/><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/1030_WT_Hummingbirds-Panel_4.png\" alt=\"High-speed cameras revealed that, at first, the birds flapped their wings to fly through the gap sideways. Image (top): A side view of a hummingbird shows how it flies sideways through a gap, bringing its left wing forward and its right wing backward. As the hummingbird flies sideways through the gap, it says, \u201cI\u2019m just gonna scooch through here\u2026\u201d Image (bottom): A bottom view of the same hummingbird shows how it brings its left wing forward and right wing backward to scooch through the gap. \" class=\"wp-image-3139759\" width=\"680\" height=\"965\" \/><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1030\" height=\"754\" src=\"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/1030_WT_Hummingbirds-Panel_5.png\" alt=\"This method might allow hummingbirds to quickly backtrack if they run into obstacles and want to reroute. Image: A hummingbird has just flow sideways through two forked branches but finds a dense bush with pink flowers on the other side that it cannot get through. The hummingbird is saying, \u201cOops, never mind!\u201d A yellow arrow shows that it\u2019s starting to fly back in the direction it came. \" class=\"wp-image-3139760\" \/><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1030\" height=\"1487\" src=\"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/1030_WT_Hummingbird-Panel_6.png\" alt=\"After traveling through the gap a few times, though, the birds learned to flatten their wings against their bodies. And they shot through the hole like bullets. Image (top): A side view of the hummingbird shows how it pins its wings to its body to zip through a gap, saying \u201cBombs away!\u201d as it goes. Image (bottom): A bottom view of the same hummingbird shows how its wings lay flat against its body as it pulls this maneuver. \" class=\"wp-image-3139761\" \/><figcaption><span class=\"credit wp-credit-3139761\">JoAnna Wendel<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>.cheat-sheet-cta {<br \/>\n  border: 1px solid #ffffff;<br \/>\n  margin-top: 20px;<br \/>\n  background-image: url(&#8220;https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/cta-module@2x-2048&#215;239-1.png&#8221;);<br \/>\n  padding: 10px;<br \/>\n  clear: both;<br \/>\n}<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-group cheat-sheet-cta is-layout-flow\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container\">\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\">Do you have a science question? We can help!<\/h2>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><a href=\"https:\/\/forms.gle\/YbhPosFTMqjbSNnV7\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Submit your question here<\/a>, and we might answer it an upcoming issue of&nbsp;<em>Science News Explores<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/article\/hummingbird-wings-fly-through-small-spaces-science-comic\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Hummingbird wings are amazing. They can flap dozens of times per second. And they can twist in ways that let hummingbirds fly upside down and backwards. But these wings also have one big limitation. They can\u2019t bend as hummingbirds fly. That means hummingbirds shouldn\u2019t be able to slip through gaps narrower than their wingspan. Yet [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55310,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.snexplores.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/1440_WT_banner_border_thick.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[606],"tags":[54613,4602,54614,5152],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55309"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55309"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55309\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":55311,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55309\/revisions\/55311"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}