Birds able to sleep during flight?

Scientists have for the first time found proof revealing birds' ability to sleep while flying.

Some birds are known for their ability to fly for prolonged periods of time, but scientists weren't able to prove their ability to sleep during flight until now. In order to test the ability, an international team of scientists equipped frigatebirds, a family of Galapagos seabirds, with small devices measuring brain activity and head movements.

Frigatebirds are, according to the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology, large seabirds which fly above the ocean for weeks searching for fish and squid. Some of the tested birds flew over 2,896 kilometers in around ten days.

By analyzing the frigatebirds' brain activity, the team has discovered that they sleep while flying with one or even both brain hemispheres shut down.

Despite this ability, it has been recorded that the birds sleep for less than an hour during daytime flight, whereas, on land, they sleep for seven hours a day on average.

Scientists are still not sure how the birds are able to function with so few hours of sleep.

birds

frigatebirds

Max Planck Institute for Ornithology