I saw the largest flock of Canada Geese I have ever seen yesterday flying over Guildford yesterday, there must have been at least 25 in a perfect triangle, it was an amazing sight and caused everyone in the street to stop and look up at them!

I have heard several "theories" as to why the geese fly in formation, the most recent being that the tips of the wings of the geese infront create some sort of air feature which makes it easier for the geese behind to fly in their wake. Does anyone have a definitive answer as to why they do fly in formation?

They are 'drafting'--just like bicyclists!

Were they honking? Usually they make quite a racket when there's a large flock like that.

Kingfisher

Apparently they do it for two reasons:

"First, it conserves their energy. Each bird flies slightly above the bird in front of him, resulting in a reduction of wind resistance. The birds take turns being in the front, falling back when they get tired. In this way, the geese can fly for a long time before they must stop for rest.

The second benefit to the V formation is that it is easy to keep track of every bird in the group. Fighter pilots often use this formation for the same reason".

This post was last modified: 03-10-2007 09:18 PM by chascreek.

It's amazing how nature comes up with such clever tactics, and how the birds can fly in the V formation without any sort of "training". They just instinctively know that they must take it in turns to fly at the front to conserve energy.

We can learn a lot from nature and how it works, fighter pilots using the same formation is just one example. Nature has evolved over millions of years to find an efficient solution so we should look to emulate it at every oppurtunity, although it's not perfect!

Hi Exeract, you answered your own question really, the tecnical term for the displaced air from the wing tips of the bird in front is known as "Tip Votices" This has the effect of making the airflow faster to the following bird and therefore increases the lift that the following bird(s )wing can produce.This lets the following bird(s) expend less energy in normal flight.Kingfisher was right, If you are following another vehicle i,e a bike, car etc on a road then you have the benifit of the first vehicle " punching a hole " in the air. For the birds, the benefit is greater because the tip vortices stream off the wing tip in a spirel and increase the available lift both above and below the wing, due to the higher relative wind speed acting on the wing and increasing the available lift. However, if you stray too far away from the bird (or aircraft ) in front, you will end up in the downward portion of the spiral tip vortice, so you could end up inverted!!!!! So, like the birds, stay close and look after your nearest and dearest!!!!

This post was last modified: 06-10-2007 08:13 PM by skippy.

Thank you for all your answers! I was inclined to think thats what it was, but you've cleared it up for me in great detail. As Riana said it is a wonder how birds have evolved to know things like this, it is one of the reasons I love nature so much!

As for honking, I only had a brief glimpse of them and they were fairly quiet at the time.

Should that be Vortices?