Flamingos are filter feeders that reside off shrimp, algae and different nibbles in wetlands all over the world.
Serhat Cetinkaya/Anadolu by way of Getty Photographs
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Serhat Cetinkaya/Anadolu by way of Getty Photographs
Flamingos look swish, however when it is time to eat, they’re very foolish.
“All of their feeding conduct is so bizarre,” says Steven Whitfield, the director of terrestrial and wetlands conservation on the Audubon Nature Institute in New Orleans, La.
The lanky birds feed on shrimp and algae in briny swamps and marshes all over the world. To seize a chew, they stick their heads underwater and open and shut their invoice quickly, as if chattering. Then they stomp their ft and wobble round within the mud, bobbing their heads up and down as they go.
It isn’t instantly obvious why the enduring pink birds would take this absurd strategy to getting a meal. They’re filter feeders, “so that they’re form of just like the fowl model of an oyster,” Whitfield says. They pressure water by their L-shaped beaks, trapping shrimp, algae, seeds and anything they discover tasty.
However with their heads virtually between their legs, their payments seem like the other way up and going through the mistaken method to scoop up the shrimp and algae in entrance of them.
“Flamingos are doing every little thing mistaken, it looks like,” says Saad Bhamla, a biophysicist at Georgia Tech College who research how animals use physics to resolve issues. Bhamla’s then-student, Victor Ortega-Jiménez, first observed the odd feeding conduct throughout a day trip for the laboratory on the Atlanta Zoo a couple of years again. Ortega-Jiménez wished to seek out out what was happening.
“All we want is a hook, an statement, and it is off to the races,” Bhamla says.
In fact, flamingos know completely effectively what they’re doing, and now so does Bhamla’s group. Writing in this week’s issue of the journal Proceedings of the Nationwide Academy of Sciences, the crew reveals that the complete flamingo feeding course of is definitely a tour de pressure in fluid dynamics.
The fowl is creating vortices within the water with virtually each transfer. Take, for instance, the bobbing of its head. The form of its invoice creates a tiny twister because it pulls out of the water. The swirling stirs up prey and traps it lengthy sufficient for the fowl to duck again in and scoop it up. Identical goes for the chattering, which pulls meals up towards its beak.
Then there’s the unusual stomping of their ft. The examine finds that flamingos’ webbed toes create a pair of vortices that push meals towards their payments. That is why it is smart to have the pinnacle going through the ft as an alternative of no matter is in entrance of them.
“What they’re principally doing is taking part in with fluid dynamics — utilizing the beak, utilizing their legs, utilizing their heads and necks,” Bhamla says.
Finally, Bhamla says, flamingos could have some extra to show people. He works with chemists who, amongst different issues, wish to learn to higher filter water by membranes. These membranes steadily clog up with particles related in measurement to what the flamingos filter for his or her meals. So it appears attainable that among the vortex-inducing strategies of flamingos could possibly be tailored to assist hold the filters clear.
Now, “we’re principally utilizing flamingo-inspired intelligent methods” to attempt to give you options, he says.
Whitfield, who was not affiliated with the work, says that it exhibits the wonderful thing about science — there are at all times mysteries ready to be solved.
“And with birds as weird as flamingos,” he provides, “there’s in all probability greater than common.”
