Investigating wind effects on insect migration

Abstract

Understanding the response of migrating insects to the wind along their path is an active area in insect migration research. In this article, two methods for describing wind response are illustrated and evaluated by analysing a model of migratory movement with a realistic scatter in the flight direction. The results show that both methods give robust and reliable results when insects simply maintain a constant heading in response to winds with a cross track component. However, neither method is reliable for evaluating whether insects are compensating for wind drift and maintaining a constant track towards their destination.