In World War I they used pigeons to send messenges. I read that they were 95% accurate. How did the pigeons know where to go?

Brainyblonde

How Do Pigeons Home? By Rupert Sheldrake After nearly a century of dedicated but frustrating research, no one knows how pigeons home, and all attempts to explain their navigational ability in terms of known senses and physical forces have so far proved unsuccessful. 'The problem of navigation remains essentially unsolved. http://www.transaction.net/science/seven/home.html However, the article does mention infrasound, sense of smell, magnetic sensitivity and nonlocal quantum phenomena. Aug 28 04, 11:06 AM

sue943

They do sometimes get lost, recently one was flying 200 miles from France to England and ended up near Niagra Falls, some 3,000 miles off course. My link to the story didn't work so I am reproducing it here, copyright Irish Examiner.com. I R I S H E X A M I N E R . C O M - 28 August 2004. Wayward bird flies off course 19 August 2004 A HOMING pigeon which flew off course during a race between France and Britain was found 3,000 miles away near Niagara Falls. The wayward bird disappeared in May while flying 200 miles from France to owner Frank Brammer’s house in Gloucester. But a few weeks later he received a phone call from a woman in Canada who had found the bird. Brammer said the bird must have hitched a ride with a ship as pigeons can only fly about 500 miles a day. The woman had found Mr Brammer’s phone number on the plastic ring on the pigeon’s leg when she noticed it was from Britain. Aug 28 04, 11:16 AM

Baloo55th

They would return to a base where they had been living for some time. They would only be able to take messages from the front line (a variable location) to a fixed base somewhere more peaceful, and couldn't bring replies back from HQ. Only if the front line was fixed in position for long enough to get pigeons trained up there could a two way exchange be possible. And even then, there'd have to be a physical exchange of pigeons before they could be reused! Aug 31 04, 3:16 AM