On a Wing and a Prayer

How many ways can you send a message nowadays?  Text a friend, to say you’re on your way.  Email a professor to ask a question about an upcoming test.  The list goes on, but many, if not most of the items found on it haven’t existed for the majority of human history.  So how did people send messages before the advent of electricity, and even organized postal services? 

Those of us that have taken Geometry, or have any common sense at all would know that the fastest way to travel from point A to point B is a straight line.  But with unpredictable, or difficult terrain, getting a message to point B quickly as possible is a challenge, if not impossible.  The expression “As the crow flies,” speaks of the assumption that a bird is not as limited by the lay of the land, and can generally fly in a very straight line.  Because of this, pigeons, also called to as Messenger or Carrier pigeons, have been domesticated and used in communication for thousands of years. 

As early as 2900 B.C.E. Egypt was making use of these birds, by releasing them from ships to announce important visitors.  These useful birds continued to be used throughout history by many different cultures, such as Greece, China, Persia, and India.  The Greeks purportedly used pigeons to announce the winners of the Olympic Games.  Messenger pigeons have also been used as valuable tools in war.  There is an account of Crusaders intercepting a messenger pigeon that carried a message to a city under siege, announcing reinforcements.  The Crusaders forged another message instead which read that there would be no more reinforcements, and re-released it, so the city under siege surrendered to King Richard’s army, three days before their reinforcements came.  (Fang, 2008)

In both WWI and WWII messenger pigeons were widely used, even when radios and telegraphs were available, having 95% success rates.  There are many stories about the birds.  One tells of a pigeon named “Cher Ami” sent out by a battalion who was under friendly fire.  The opposing side saw the bird and opened fire, wounding it, but it continued back and successfully passed its message on, despite having been blinded in one eye, shot in the breast, and having its leg (the one with the message) nearly severed.  Cher Ami and other Carrier pigeons like it received special medals after the war. (Greelis, n.d.)

For a long time it’s been a mystery how pigeons are so good at finding their way “home”, but it is now believed that they use both the sun, and earth’s magnetic fields to navigate.  But how can an animal be sensitive to magnets?  It was believed that they read the fields using special white blood cells called “Macrophages”, but more recently it was discovered that macrophages are not in fact sensitive to magnetic fields, and this confused scientists even more.  (Suzuki, 2012)

In another study, research showed that that Pigeons now also commonly use man-made road systems to navigate, as, it is believed, the path is easier to remember than open countryside.  They make left and right turns at intersections; they have even been documented flying around roundabouts before taking their desired exits. (Davies, 2004)

Clearly, regardless of the means, these birds are remarkable navigators, and have been extremely effective messengers for humans for millennia.  Without their expedient services, there’s no telling how mankind would be different today.

References: 

Greelis, J. (n.d.). Pigeons in military history. Retrieved from http://www.pigeoncenter.org/militarypigeons.html

Suzuki, Y. (2012, April 15). How do homing pigeons find their way home? the mystery thickens.. Retrieved from http://www.sott.net/article/244132-How-Do-Homing-Pigeons-Find-Their-Way-Home-The-Mystery-Thickens

Davies, C. (2004, February 5). How do homing pigeons navigate? they follow roads. The Telegraph, Retrieved from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1453494/How-do-homing-pigeons-navigate-They-follow-roads.html

Fang, I. (2008). Pigeon post. Retrieved from 

http://www.mediahistory.umn.edu/archive/pigeonpost.html