Animal Magnetism
Cattle tend to orient their bodies in a north-south direction.
Zoologists Sabine Begall and Hynek Burda of the University of Duisburg-Essen and their colleagues studied photographs of 8,510 cattle in 308 herds around the world. Two out of every three animals in the photos aligned themselves in a north-south direction.
Grazing animals are known to position themselves to minimise heat loss by wind or maximize their exposure to sunlight. However, the researchers say that weather did not affect their findings.
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