bumblebees at sea

[johnalison]

Hi B o B.
I don't think that answers the question of scale. A 777 can fly over 6500nm without refuelling and a Monarch Butterfly can fly 350nm on one fuel load. Just wondering which is the more fuel efficient?
I find the mere fact that an insect has enough fuel to cross the Channel astounding.
To add that it's the time in the air which is so amazing rather than the distance covered. Seems that butterflies and 777s have similar endurance.

Many years ago, when I was a student, I managed to extract the wing muscle of a fly and make a microscope slide of it. Gawd knows how I did it, but what I saw was striated muscle, much like mine, so presumably its physiology is much the same, and relying of glycogen and fats for energy. I know that you get 9 Calories/gm of fat, but what this is in terms of aviation fuel, I have no idea.

 

[horatio_nelson]

Not an insect, but we were used as a landing pad by a small brown bird (sorry, couldn't identify the species) when crossing from Peterhead to Eyemouth; we were approximately abeam of Fife Ness at the time, and were at least 20 miles from the nearest land. The poor little thing was obviously exhausted, but after resting for a while it set off again in broadly the right direction to reach land, though I'm afraid I doubt that it could make it.

Had a similar thing happen about 12 miles off Portland, the bird landed in the cockpit looking tired and dazed, then hopped into a little cubby hole in the coaming, tucked his head under his wing and slept for the next 2hrs until we got to Weymouth, once alongside he woke up, hopped onto the pushpit, gathered himself then flew off over the quayside Didn't seem bothered by our presence at all while he was on board. I later discovered it was a Meadow Pipit.

 

[Jungle Jim]

We picked a hitchhiker up mid-channel last weekend, not a bee but a wasp. It stayed with the boat right up to the French coast. It would occasionally fly away from the boat but invariably reappeared some minutes later.

 

[VO5]

We had a butterfly land on deck in mid Atlantic, 600 miles from the nearest land. The visit was very brief. It just took off again and disappeared.

 

[Spuddy]

Thanks for mention of "A sting in the tail". Got it on kindle ad enjoying it

 

[ChrisRayner]

Thanks for mention of "A sting in the tail". Got it on kindle ad enjoying it

Me too. Lovely book.

 

[geoffatstanpit]

I once had a wasp arrive within 30 seconds of opening the marmalade in the middle of Lyme Bay. That means extraordinary eyesight and over 100 knots against the wind.

 

[Robert Wilson]

I remember seeing a table of different forms of animal and human transport. I think that starting with human walking getting 1 mile per unit of energy, birds came out best with about 6, but a human on a bicycle scored 15. I don't know about insects.

I've never seen an insect riding a bicycle. Now THAT would be an interesting experiment for that Chinese bloke........

Seriously. I sailed in May with a retired airline pilot who told me that to carry enough fuel for an emergency diversion burning one tonne of fuel, the plane would need to carry twenty tonnes extra fuel. I'm not sure how that works, but he was totally serious.
That's one heck of a lot of nectar for a bumbly-bee

 

[johnalison]

I've never seen an insect riding a bicycle. Now THAT would be an interesting experiment for that Chinese bloke........

Seriously. I sailed in May with a retired airline pilot who told me that to carry enough fuel for an emergency diversion burning one tonne of fuel, the plane would need to carry twenty tonnes extra fuel. I'm not sure how that works, but he was totally serious.
That's one heck of a lot of nectar for a bumbly-bee

Yes. There's a quiz question along the lines of: which has more power, a Kg of dynamite or the same of petrol. I think the petrol has about a thousand times more.

 

[mjcoon]

Yes. There's a quiz question along the lines of: which has more power, a Kg of dynamite or the same of petrol. I think the petrol has about a thousand times more.

In that case it must be about energy, not power. The same energy in a short time, as in an explosion, is a higher power (physically speaking!)...

Mike.