Wow, nature is so unique and interesting! By the way, please never show me this picture again!
I’ve seen that image many times before, but not really stopped to think about the details.
-
‘Tongue bones’ disturbs me. Doubly so when they seem to be shown curving around the inside of the skull. Are they actually bones, or more akin to tendons?
-
A woodpeckers tongue appears to be bifurcated at the back. I suppose that makes sense if it curves upwards rather than down the throat, but still; nature is weird.
-
1000G is a lot of force. Even if the brain is padded by the tongue (it’s like they’re almost licking their own brains), the bulk of the brain is still getting bounced around. I wonder if we can learn anything about mitigating TBIs from them?
Just making sure you understood ‘g’ here is grams (so 1 kg or 9.8 N) and not 1000 G as in the force of gravity (which would be 9800 N / kg).
**Edit: I am wrong, it is quoted at around 1000 times the force of gravity. That is insane.
If you check other sources as well, it seems to, in fact, be 1000 times gravity. For example check The Audubon Society where it’s quoted as ‘1500 g-force’ units, compared to about 5 on a rollercoaster, this paper which seems to show it as even greater in figure 2 or The Zooilogical Society of London which cites 10000 m/s/s or around 1000 g.
Interestingly, as woodpecker brains apparently weight about 2.5 grams, the difference between 9.8N of force and 1000 g=0.0025*9.81*1000=24.525N isn’t all that great. From reading around it seems their skulls and tongues don’t even absorb much impact. as it’d make their digging less efficient, their brains are just light enough and structured so they don’t get damaged.
Never before have I considered the idea of “licking their own brains” and I thank you for bringing that thought into my life.
-
For the Americans, 1000g is about four sausages
How many snausages is that?
For central europeans, it’s about 10 pieces of schocko, 2 large pieces of cheese or 2 pint of beer.
Central Europe and pint don’t mix well.
Too much english use and was never on a Bierfest.
Only 1000g of force? surely it must be more
Might be 1000G but that seems excessive
I suppose the head is probably quite light and 1000g is actually a lot. G’s as a unit would be more helpful here
Well G’s only make sense grams are not a unit of force
I have often seen kg-force to mean the weight component only, assuming gravity is 9.8m/s^2.
I have only ever seen mass-force being ised by americans.
I’ve also seen it used in usability design, where it is helpful to provide users relatable information (e.g apply equivalent force to the weight of a 1kg bag)
Evolution, you crazy.
I want to unlearn this.
