Do Sharks Read Maps?

Setting aside the problem of breathing underwater, could you navigate through the ocean in the dark from one subterranean site to another 30 miles away?

The tiger shark can do this with ease. Nobody knows how sharks do it, but researchers believe sharks store mental maps that they use for navigation. Many think that sharks use the earth’s magnetic field to aid their navigation.

Do sharks “remember” the undersea terrain and use it to navigate? Nobody yet knows for sure.

See the BBC report Sharks navigate using ‘mental maps’ for more information.

The Creator has provided amazing navigational tools for animals that need them. We are aware of their abilities, but we don’t yet understand how they do it. Understanding the navigational tools the Creator built into animals can help man improve his own navigation, with respect to accuracy, speed, and miniaturization.

For example, monarch butterflies migrate 3,000 miles from Canada to Mexico every fall without ever having made the trip before. If you try to confuse them, they soon correct course.

All the monarch navigational equipment and calculating apparatus is packed into a pinhead-sized brain. In terms of accuracy and miniaturization, the monarch brain demonstrates a level of design engineering that far surpasses any of man’s navigational equipment.

For more information on monarch migration and navigation, see
Insect GPS
Migrating Monarchs
Navigating Monarchs

How do beavers navigate inky depths of murky ponds where eyes, ears and noses are useless? Long guard hairs growing through underfur are individually controlled by tiny muscles. Each hair’s muscle is connected to its own nerve which transmits hair movements to the brain. Beavers swim in pitch dark by “reading” water currents with their guard hairs.

Could evolutionists be correct that the very different navigational abilities of the shark, monarch butterfly, and beaver all developed by accident? No way! The Creator built His animals to perform these navigational marvels for their own good.

The shark, monarch butterfly, and beaver all display the glory of their Creator. Soli Deo Gloria.

Soli Deo Gloria.

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©William T. Pelletier, Ph.D.
“contending earnestly for the faith”
“destroying speculations against the knowledge of God”
(Jude 1:3; 2 Cor 10:4)
Monday March 7, 2011 A.D.

Read my March 2011 Bible-Science column
The Genesis Code.

But now ask the beasts, and let them teach you;
And the birds of the heavens, and let them tell you.
Or speak to the earth, and let it teach you;
And let the fish of the sea declare to you.
Who among all these does not know
That the hand of the LORD has done this,
In whose hand is the life of every living thing,
And the breath of all mankind? (Job 12:7-10)