This Bird Flaps Its Wings Just Once To Fly Over 160 Kilometers

A newly published study reveals how the largest soaring bird in the world conquers the sky without even flapping its wings. The Andean condor is the heaviest soaring bird alive on Earth with the wingspan 3 meters and weight can reach 15 kilograms.

A team of scientists strapped recording equipment to 8 condors in Patagonia with the aim of recording their wingbeat over a flight time of 250 hours. It turns out that the birds flapped their wings for only 1% of the total time they are in the air, mostly when they take off. One of the birds flew for 5 hours over 166 kilometers without flapping its wings.

The study findings are Study co-author Emily Shepard, a biologist at Swansea University, Wales, said:

“Condors are expert pilots - but we just hadn't expected they would be quite so expert.”

Meanwhile, bird flight expert David Lentink from Stanford University said:

“The finding that they basically almost never beat their wings and just soar is mind-blowing.”

While the sky may look empty to humans, it’s so much different for birds. In the sky, they experience currents of warm rising air, wind gusts, as well as streams of air pushed upward from ground features like mountains.

By learning to ride air currents, some birds can travel over long distances while not having to flap their wings so much.

Scientists studying flying animals put flight into 2 types: soaring flight and flapping flight. Flapping flight is like biking uphill while the soaring flight is similar to coasting downhill. In previous studies, it was found that white storks flap for 17% and osprey flap for 25% of their flights over land.

The extreme soaring skill is crucial for the Andean condor’s scavenger lifestyle, which involves circling high mountains for hours every day in search of food, according to study co-author and biologist Sergio Lambertucci.

The scientists programmed the recording equipment to fall off the birds after a week.

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