Migration is one of the great wonders of nature. More and more we discover the secrets, finding absolutely amazing facts. One bird even flies more than 1.000.000 km, or 3 times from Earth to Moon!!!!!!
Explaining the migration in this blog is really impossible. Better read some books about it, for example Migration of Melissa Maintz. So here, as a starter, some facts :
- There are several types of migration. North-south, east-west, and even a walking migration. In Australia the emu migrates walking 500 km, day after day 25 km.
- A absolute champion is the arctic tern. Migrating from the Artic to Antarctica, 50.000-70.000 km, and back, this champion gives himself 2 summers. This bird sees more sunlight than any other creature on our planet. Living 25-30 years, he flies more than 1.000.000 km, or 3 x from Earth to Moon!!!! Is a rare visitor of The Gambia. Good luck.
- Yearly more than 200 different birds migrate to The Gambia. From the north, but also from the south. To follow: it seems some birds now don’t stop anymore in The Gambia but fly more south. Because of the climate change? The food? The territory?
- Yes, some birds sleep during flying. It’s called USWS: unihemipheric slow-wave sleep. They are able to put half of the brain on slow function, sleeping, the other half remanes awake and alert. They do this around 50 minutes a day.
So, when seeing in The Gambia a whimbrel, greenshank, redshank, ringed plover, osprey, black-winged stilt or squacco heron ( snd many more) : yes, it’s possible you did see this bird in Europe.
