SCIENCE
How do nutcrackers navigate? Use our resources to find out.
Teachers, scroll down for a quick list of key resources in our Teachers’ Toolkit.

Photograph by Peter Essick, National Geographic
Discussion Ideas
- The Robert Krulwich blog says the Clark’s nutcracker can keep track of up to 20,000 mental maps. (Read more about Clark’s nutcrackers here.) What are these maps of—what information do they store?
- They’re treasure maps! X marks the spot for 20,000 hidden caches of seeds the birds began storing six months ago, during the summer.
- Where do nutcrackers store their caches?
- Anywhere. According to Krulwich, “Sometimes [the birds] peck little holes in the topsoil or under the leaf litter. Sometimes they leave seeds in nooks high up on trees.”
- How do the birds find the caches?
- They triangulate! Triangulation is a method of determining distance or placement of a point by measuring angles to it from known points. Here’s a triangulation network that nicely highlights known points, unknown points, and measured angles.
- According to Krulwich, “Nobody knows exactly how the birds manage this, but the best guess is that when a nutcracker digs its hole, it will notice two or three permanent objects at the site: an irregular rock, a bush, a tree stump. The objects, or markers, will be at different angles from the hiding place.”
- They triangulate! Triangulation is a method of determining distance or placement of a point by measuring angles to it from known points. Here’s a triangulation network that nicely highlights known points, unknown points, and measured angles.
TEACHERS’ TOOLKIT
Nat Geo: How a 5-Ounce Bird Stores 10,000 Maps in its Head
Nat Geo: How Do Birds Navigate?
Cornell Lab of Ornithology: Clark’s Nutcracker
Intergovernmental Committee on Surveying and Mapping: Triangulation