Ask Experts Questions for FREE Help !
Ask

Birds on Wires

Asked Aug 8, 2005, 06:24 AM — 1 Answer
Could you please explain how birds can sit on electrical wires without being harmed? My 7 year old son asked me this and I cannot answer him!

Search this Thread
Share |
1 Answer
labman's Avatar
labman Posts: 10,673, Reputation: 3050
Über Member
  
#2

Aug 8, 2005, 07:08 AM
For electricity to harm you, it must travel from one conductor through your body to another conductor. Birds get away with touching the wire, because they only touch one wire. Their body has electricity in it, and would die if they touched anything else. Occasionally a bird or squirrel does get killed, especially larger birds. They can even cause power outages when they touch 2 wires or a wire and something grounded. If you look around power lines carefully, you may see a dead bird or squirrel.
Helpful
Not your question? Ask your question View similar questions
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Add your answer here.

Remove Text Formatting
 

Undo
Redo
  
Decrease Size
Increase Size
Bold
Italic
Underline
Align Left
Align Center
Align Right
Ordered List
Unordered List
Decrease Indent
Increase Indent
Insert Email Link
Wrap [QUOTE] tags around selected text
Wrap [CODE] tags around selected text
Wrap [HTML] tags around selected text
Wrap [PHP] tags around selected text
Wrap [YOUTUBE] tags around selected text
Notification Type:



Check out some similar questions!

3 wires + 2 wires  POOL MOTOR [ 2 Answers ]

I need help connecting a motor for my pool. The motor has 3 wires coming out of it. 1 white, 1 black, 1 black with a white stripe. A continuity test on the 2 blacks says they are wired together somewhere. I have a power cable coming out of the ground. 1 white + 1 black cables inside. ...

Birds [ 1 Answers ]

I am not sure if this is the right category but here goes. I had a bird in my basement yesterday. Does anyone have any ideas hw it might have gotten in there? I was wondering if birds will crawl through holes and how big of a hole? Thanks

Birds [ 8 Answers ]

What do birds never do on the ground?

Hampton Bay remote wires do not match fan wires [ 1 Answers ]

Yesterday I installed a new Hunter ceiling fan. I also purchased a Hampton Bay wireless wall switch. Everything went well until I wired up the remote receiver. The receiver has a blue wire for the light that is supposed to connect to the blue wire (light) from the fan. The Hunter fan does not have...

View more Science for Children questions Search