For the first time ever, scientists from The Cornell Lab of Ornithology have created a fascinating migration map of 188 bird species in the Western Hemisphere, capturing all of their movements for an entire year. The study uncovered the similarities in the routes used by specific species and shows each of their patterns in a unique animated map.
"We used millions of observations from the eBird citizen-science database," Frank La Sorte, lead author of the study, said in a press release. "After tracing the migration routes of all these species and comparing them, we concluded that a combination of geographic features and broad-scale atmospheric conditions influence the choice of routes used during spring and fall migration."
According to La Sorte, one of the most interesting findings of the study was that bird species that make their way over the Atlantic Ocean during their fall migration in order to reach the Caribbean and South America do so in a clockwise loop, however, on their way back in the spring, this same journey takes place more inland. Some of the species that follow this pattern include bobolinks, Cape May warblers and Bicknell's thrush.
