WEBVTT - What Animal Has the Best Echolocation Abilities?

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to brain stuff from how Stuff Works. Hey, brain stuff,

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<v Speaker 1>Lauren vogel Bomb Here, take a second to think about

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<v Speaker 1>a nar wall. It's a whale with a unicorn horn

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<v Speaker 1>of fairy tale animal, right, so it may come as

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<v Speaker 1>no surprise that this improbable animal of the North Seas

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<v Speaker 1>has actual superpowers. The nar wall's spiraled horn isn't just decorative.

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<v Speaker 1>It's actually a modified tooth that can grow the lengths

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<v Speaker 1>of up to nine feet that's about three meters. These

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<v Speaker 1>tusks contain around ten million nerve endings. Some nar walls

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<v Speaker 1>have two tusks, while others have none, and they use

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<v Speaker 1>them for a variety of purposes, like testing the chemical

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<v Speaker 1>concentrations in seawater. The males use their tusks to advertise

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<v Speaker 1>the size of their testicles to females, and it would

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<v Speaker 1>be a shame if they didn't fight using them like

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<v Speaker 1>fencing foils, which don't worry, they totally do. But a

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<v Speaker 1>study published in the journal p l Os one finds

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<v Speaker 1>the nar wall in possession of the most powerful directional

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<v Speaker 1>sonar of any animal on earth. Because, of course, lots

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<v Speaker 1>of marine mammals use echolocation to find their way around

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<v Speaker 1>in the ocean's murky depths, but disability to use sonar

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<v Speaker 1>to determine where objects are in space is especially crucial

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<v Speaker 1>for narwhals. They're deep divers and just one of two

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<v Speaker 1>species of toothed whales who live year round in the

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<v Speaker 1>Arctic Circle off the coast of Canada. In Greenland, the

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<v Speaker 1>seas are most often completely covered in ice, and our

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<v Speaker 1>whales live in complete darkness for much of the year.

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<v Speaker 1>Since nar wall has to come up to the surface

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<v Speaker 1>of the water for air every five minutes or so,

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<v Speaker 1>they have to be able to precisely and quickly detect

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<v Speaker 1>small holes and cracks in the ice through which to

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<v Speaker 1>grab quick gulps of air. Dr Kristen Laughter, an ecologist

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<v Speaker 1>at the University of Washington, told The New York Times.

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<v Speaker 1>You don't see open water for miles and miles, and

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<v Speaker 1>suddenly there's a small crack and you'll see our walls

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<v Speaker 1>in it. I've always wondered, how do these animals navigate

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<v Speaker 1>under that, and how do they find these small openings

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<v Speaker 1>to breathe. To find out, she and her research team

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<v Speaker 1>placed microphones under the water around ice packs in bath

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<v Speaker 1>in Bay Thu's off the southern coast of Greenland and

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<v Speaker 1>happens to be where of the world narwhal's spend their winter.

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<v Speaker 1>The team then listened for the telltale sound of echolocating clicks.

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<v Speaker 1>They discovered that not only do nar whales produce them

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<v Speaker 1>at a rate of up to one thousand clicks per

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<v Speaker 1>second and receive the echoes back on pads and their

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<v Speaker 1>lower jaws, they can also direct them with incredible accuracy,

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<v Speaker 1>like the narrow beam of an adjustable flashlight. According to

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<v Speaker 1>the researchers, it's the most precise directional beam of all

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<v Speaker 1>animal echolocators. Other whales broadcast their echolocating sounds in all directions,

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<v Speaker 1>which is useful for receiving data back from great distances,

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<v Speaker 1>and it turns out narwhals can do that too. Other

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<v Speaker 1>animals like bats also use echolocation, but the narwhal's ability

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<v Speaker 1>to focus its clicks bests them all. When narwhal's track prey,

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<v Speaker 1>the study shows they can widen the sonar beam to

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<v Speaker 1>take in a larger area. In this way, they can

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<v Speaker 1>get a sense of their surroundings with more accuracy than

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<v Speaker 1>any other echolocating animal on the planet. Let this be

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<v Speaker 1>a lesson to us all that just because an animal

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<v Speaker 1>seems mythologically amazing. That doesn't mean that it isn't. Today's

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<v Speaker 1>episode was written by Jesselyn Shields and produced by Tristan McNeil.

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<v Speaker 1>For more on this and lots of other superpowered topics,

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<v Speaker 1>visit our home planet, how Stuff Works dot com