Genetic Memory?

How do birds - my favorites are those incredible weaver birds
(Ploceidae) - know how to build their nest?

Bred in captivity, isolated from other birds, how do songbirds know how
to warble their, highly specific, "tune"?

The salmon (Salmonidae), busily building breeding strength in its vast
pelagic hunting currents, how does it know how to find its way back to
the one insignificant and remote specific stream where it years ago was
spawned? Indeed, never having experienced such things before, how does
it know that it makes sense jumping the rapids/falls encountered?

How does the spider wasp (Pomilidae) larva know that it must consume
non-vital parts of its living (but paralyzed) food source (usually a
spider) first, making the food last until pupation time?

The itty bitty spider, where did it learn how to build its intricate
web?

Where does an infant's grip response come from?

A common answer to all of the above questions is usually
"instincts"... Instinctual drives are said to be *inherent*
dispositions towards particular actions in certain situations. In
other words, *inherited* stimuli response/reaction patterns.

Inherited, as in genetic memories? If not, how does evolution explain
the concept of "instincts"?

Reference: "Epigenetic memory of active gene transcription is inherited
through somatic cell nuclear transfer," January 2005
(http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/102/6/1957)


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Relevant Pages

  • Re: more about spiders: why not get eaten?
    ... > I've noticed a lot of orb-weavers do not sit in the web, but rather, sit ... > Why don't they get eaten by all the insectivorous birds? ... I've observed more than one bird stealing morsels from a web. ... spider is visible, sometimes not. ...
    (rec.birds)
  • Re: bird feeders
    ... Some birds may hate change, but the ones out my way are pretty ... I brought my cage-enclosed tube feeder up from the lower ... forested area where it was hard for me to get to for refilling, ... food source, down they swoop, raising all kinds of racket so the whole ...
    (rec.birds)
  • Re: Great Egret eats hummingbirds
    ... hunt Hummers and is taking advantage of a ready food source. ... Like Lanny and his smart Duck below, birds are a lot smarter than some ... Dave Fouchey ... I didn't say ALL birds were Einstein's! ...
    (rec.birds)