Tracking points on their beaks and heads as the animals pecked on wood, the scientists found that all the woodpecker skulls remained stiff—that is, their heads didn’t come to a halt any slower than their beaks, the team reports today in Current Biology.
Apparently, they must have more resilient brains then. Or maybe the really helpful trick is having less mass -> less inertia -> less damage.
Yes, that was the previous hypothesis. But any measure that cushioned the brain also makes the head a less effective hammer. They do have weird tongues that wrap around their skull, but I guess it’s just so they have more latent space for the slack to go. They can extend their tongues long past their beak and into holes in trees, and maybe that’s the only explanation for this evolutionary oddity.
Apparently, they must have more resilient brains then. Or maybe the really helpful trick is having less mass -> less inertia -> less damage.
I thought the cool thing about woodpeckers was supposed to be that their tongue wrapped around their brain, and that’s how the brain was protected?
Yes, that was the previous hypothesis. But any measure that cushioned the brain also makes the head a less effective hammer. They do have weird tongues that wrap around their skull, but I guess it’s just so they have more latent space for the slack to go. They can extend their tongues long past their beak and into holes in trees, and maybe that’s the only explanation for this evolutionary oddity.
Either way, they’re very cool little birds :)