Releases of surgically deafened homing pigeons indicate that aural cues play a significant role in their navigational system

Experienced homing pigeons with extirpated cochleae and lagenae were released from six sites in upstate New York and western Pennsylvania on 17 days between 1973 and 1975 by William T. Keeton and his co-workers at Cornell University. The previously unpublished data indicate that departure directions of the operated birds were significantly different from those of sham-operated control birds (314 total), indicating that aural cues play an important part in the pigeon’s navigational system. Moreover, propagation modeling of infrasonic waves using meteorological data for the release days supports the possibility that control birds used infrasonic signals to determine their homeward direction. Local acoustic ‘shadow’ zones, therefore, could have caused initial disorientation of control birds at release sites where they were normally well oriented. Experimental birds plausibly employed an alternate ‘route-reversal’ strategy to return home perhaps using their ocular-based magnetic compass. We suggest, based on Keeton’s results from another site of long-term disorientation, that experienced pigeons depend predominantly on infrasonic cues for initial orientation, and that surgical removal of their aural sense compelled them to switch to a secondary navigational strategy.