Long-Term Memory for a Life on the Move

Evidence is accumulating that cognitive abilities are shaped by the specific ecological conditions to which animals are exposed. Long-distance migratory birds may provide a striking example of this. Field observations have shown that, at least in some species, a substantial proportion of individuals...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS 2003-05, Vol.100 (10), p.5863-5866
Main Authors: Mettke-Hofmann, Claudia, Gwinner, Eberhard
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal cognition
Animal migration behavior
Animals
Autumn
Aviary birds
Aviculture
Biological Sciences
Birds
Breeding sites
Ecology
Germany
Israel
Lifestyles
Memory
Memory - physiology
Migration Period
Models, Biological
Periodicity
Seasonal migration
Songbirds - physiology
Warblers
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Summary:Evidence is accumulating that cognitive abilities are shaped by the specific ecological conditions to which animals are exposed. Long-distance migratory birds may provide a striking example of this. Field observations have shown that, at least in some species, a substantial proportion of individuals return to the same breeding, wintering, and stopover sites in successive years. This observation suggests that migrants have evolved special cognitive abilities that enable them to accomplish these feats. Here we show that memory of a particular feeding site persisted for at least 12 months in a long-distance migrant, whereas a closely related nonmigrant could remember such a site for only 2 weeks. Thus, it seems that the migratory lifestyle has influenced the learning and memorizing capacities of migratory birds. These results build a bridge between field observations suggesting special memorization feats of migratory birds and previous neuroanatomical results from the same two species indicating an increase in relative hippocampal size from the first to the second year of life in the migrant but not in the nonmigrant.
ISSN:0027-8424
1091-6490
DOI:10.1073/pnas.1037505100