Shark tracking reveals impressive feats of navigation

The data show that tiger sharks not only know where they are going but can find their way to a feature at least 6-8 km ahead of them, although how they do this remains a mystery.

Papastamatiou says: "Many people could walk to a known destination 6-8km away, but imagine doing it in deep water and at night. As anyone who dives knows, finding your way around underwater without a compass is very difficult, but this is what we found tiger sharks could do."

Sharks have impressive sensory abilities. They have good hearing, vision and smell, can detect certain chemicals at very low concentrations and low frequency sounds at least several hundred hundred metres away. An increasing amount of evidence also suggests they may navigate by using the Earth's magnetic field.

[link to www.eurekalert.org]