originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
So what the French radio program should have said is that no animals can both fly and swim well according to human criteria for swimming. I'd say ducks and geese do quite well at both--at the very least sufficient for their purposes--and that radio programs on science are like the NY Times Science page on science.
No, fish criteria for swimming.
I know Jonathan well enough to know that he's going to reply that fish are not judgmental.
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
So what the French radio program should have said is that no animals can both fly and swim well according to human criteria for swimming. I'd say ducks and geese do quite well at both--at the very least sufficient for their purposes--and that radio programs on science are like the NY Times Science page on science.
No, fish criteria for swimming.
I know Jonathan well enough to know that he's going to reply that fish are not judgmental.
originally posted by Peter Creasey:
Judging by our constant observations of the way pelicans/gulls/skimmers/etc./etc. prey on fish near our beach place, fish have plenty of right to be highly judgemental of birds.
. . . . . Pete
Sharks gotta swim and bats gotta fly...originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
And then, of course, there's always Kern and Hammerstein.
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:
Sharks gotta swim and bats gotta fly...originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
And then, of course, there's always Kern and Hammerstein.
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
I think they were indeed talking about Cinclus cinclus.
originally posted by SFJoe:
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
I think they were indeed talking about Cinclus cinclus.
Perhaps Uria lomvia:
Flight of the Penguin
More than 70 million years ago, the ancestors of penguins could soar through the air. So why did the penguin give up flight? Scientists have now confirmed a long-suspected answer: It would rather swim.
Being both a diver and a flyer is costly and inefficient, suggests a new study of murres, penguinlike seabirds that both swim and retain command of the air. Murres "are awful flyers," says graduate student Kyle Elliott of the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Canada, an author of the new paper published online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "They beat their wings really, really fast, and they're horrible at landing."
Thick-billed murres (Uria lomvia, inset), which nest on cliffs in Alaska, Canada, and other northerly sites, expend more energy per minute of flight than any other bird, the team found. On the wing, murres burn energy at 31 times their rate at rest, the highest known ratio in a bird. In water, they're more efficient than many birds, but expend more energy while diving when compared with penguins. That suggests that by giving up flight, penguins improved their diving prowess.
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
The question isn't diving vs. flying but swimming and flying. There are lots of fish preying birds that use flight for migration and dive very effectively. Everyone has seen gulls. These birds still don't really swim: they simply move in and out of water as flying fish move in and out of air. Ducks, geese, swans, etc. however, spend time in water, move in it efficiently, feed in it--though not by diving--and fly pretty effectively. They may not swim like either you or fish judge they ought to, but if he question is are there species that have the abilities both to fly and to swim and use both centrally for their manners of feeding and/or movement, the answer surely yes.