Albatross

The Albatross is a well known seabird, especially in New Zealand. Renowned for their extraordinary wingspans, they come in many species, such as the Buller's Albatross, the Black-Browed Albatross and the Wandering Albatross (Askew, 2009). Albatrosses spend much of their life migrating throughout the Southern Ocean in search of both food and nesting sites. Their ability to locate tiny islands for these purposes in the vastness of the Southern Ocean has led many people to attempt to study their methods of navigation. One study conducted by Bonadonna et al. (2003) attempted to study whether Black-Browed Albatross used the Earth's magnetic field to navigate around the Southern Ocean, but found that their data was inconclusive. While this does not disprove the theory of magnetic cues being used, they did also discuss the possibility that the Albatross were using a method of navigation called olfaction to locate these islands. Olfaction is a method of navigation that relies on scent to find the destinations. Given how vast the Southern Ocean is and the number and small size of some of these islands, it is very possible that the Albatross simply fly around until they catch a scent. A similar study was conducted on a different species of Albatross, the Wandering Albatross, by Akesson and Alerstam (1989) to see if there was evidence that they were navigating using a geomagnetic system. Similarly to Bonadonna's study, the data was inconclusive, but this paper stated that it was unlikely that Wandering Albatross were using the magnetic field for navigation and did not supply an alternate suggestion for how the birds were navigating.

The above map from Akesson and Alerstam's study shows that the Albatross moves in a truly random pattern, in my opinion with no real navigation at all. I believe that it is most likely that these birds have a sense of path integration which allows them to remember where they first began their journey and use that as a reference point from which to work around. I believe that they also use olfaction while they are flying around in order to locate new islands.