Meeting Abstract

P1.192  Friday, Jan. 4  Cute baby birds and flight control: a coming of age story of intrigue, flips, falls from great heights, and high speed cameras CAM, S; EVANGELISTA, D*; HO, M; HUYNH, T; KRIVITSKIY, I; LIN, Y; STEVENSON, R; DUDLEY, R; Univ. of California, Berkley; Univ. of California, Berkeley; Univ. of California, Berkeley; Univ. of California, Berkeley; Univ. of California, Berkeley; Univ. of California, Berkeley; Univ. of California, Berkeley; Univ. of California, Berkeley devangel77b@gmail.com

“There is an art to flying, or rather a knack; the knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.” We dropped baby Chukar Partridge (Alectoris chukar, n=31) and Mallard Ducks (Anas platyrhynchos, n=5) from 1 day post hatching through fledging, to observe use of the wings during aerial challenges over ontogeny. Birds initially used an asymmetric flapping motion to right by rolling; this was followed by symmetric flapping motions which achieved righting more rapidly by pitching. The switch also corresponded to the first detectable instances of directed aerial descent in which the trajectories deviated from simple ballistics. Analysis of the high speed video allows examination of the details of the righting maneuvers and computation of the relative contributions of inertia and aerodynamics. The results will guide understanding of how maneuvering may shape the development or evolution of aerial behaviours in general.