THE BEHAVIOR OF LIMPETS 395 



Lottia gigantea showed that without exception, these limpets 

 returned daily, each to a given depression or other recognizable 

 spot on the rock's surface. The observations on the limpets 

 while they were moving, i.e., while the tide was coming in, 

 showed that they left their resting places very soon after the 

 first dash of spray had thoroughly wet them, and that they 

 crawled about continuously as long as the observations were 

 continued. A given individual usually left its resting place in 

 the direction in which it was headed. It would now crawl 

 across the surface of the rock, which was usually thickly covered 

 with barnacles. The path taken was not straight away from 

 the homing point but curved either to the right or to the left. 

 After going a certain distance, usually but 5-6 inches at first, 

 the limpet would turn almost around and after completing the 

 other side of an oval, such as is shown in Fig. 2A, would be back 

 at its resting place. Instead of settling down, however, the 

 animal usually started out immediately upon another journey, 

 which was likely to be longer than the first. From all that 

 could be seen this procedure was kept up; each successive jour- 

 ney was longer than the last and on each subsequent trip the 

 path became more and more irregular until the animal appeared 

 to be merely wandering about in the vicinity of its resting place. 

 The greatest distance that any animal of this species was 

 found from its home, was 16 inches. This individual was still 

 12 inches away, when observations had to be discontinued, but 

 it was found at home as usual the next day- 

 No experiments were performed to determine the ability of 

 these limpets to return to their resting place when transferred 

 bodily to a distance, though there can be little doubt but that 

 they would be able to do this to a limited extent, just as has been 

 shown by Morgan for certain species which he has unfortunately 

 failed to name. 



In general, the writer was impressed with the fact that the 

 limpet offers a much easier subject for the investigation of the 

 homing instinct than is presented by the highly motile forms, 

 such as the insects and birds, and at the same time it seems possi- 

 ble that in the investigation of the instinct which guides the lim- 

 pet over its few square inches we may find a clue which will help 

 us to explain the ability that enables birds to orient themselves 

 over hundreds of miles. 



