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Which animal has the best sense of smell?

by YPB Team

Noses, antennae, forked tongues and one mole that sniffs underwater. The famous trackers are not obviously the best ones.

  1. Bloodhound — ranked #11
    Bloodhound
    The dog whose tracking evidence courts have accepted, able to follow a trail days old.
    1000pts
  2. Snake — ranked #22
    Snake
    Collects scent particles on its forked tongue and reads them in stereo through the Jacobson's organ.
    835pts
  3. African Elephant — ranked #33
    African Elephant
    Carries more olfactory receptor genes than any other animal yet sequenced, and can smell water underground.
    762pts
  4. Grizzly Bear — ranked #44
    Grizzly Bear
    Can detect a carcass miles away, with a nose widely rated several times sharper than a bloodhound's.
    734pts
  5. Giant Anteater — ranked #55
    Giant Anteater
    The giant anteater locates termite mounds with a sense of smell rated dozens of times sharper than ours.
    659pts
  6. Turkey Vulture — ranked #66
    Turkey Vulture
    Finds carrion under a forest canopy by smell alone, which most birds of prey cannot do.
    571pts
  7. Silkmoth — ranked #77
    Silkmoth
    The male detects a single female pheromone molecule on its feathered antennae from miles downwind.
    571pts
  8. Honeybee — ranked #88
    Honeybee
    Distinguishes hundreds of floral scents, and can be trained to flag explosives in minutes.
    571pts
  9. Fruit Fly — ranked #99
    Fruit Fly
    Fruit flies locate fermenting fruit from far outside visual range using a few hundred receptor types.
    467pts
  10. Polar Bear — ranked #1010
    Polar Bear
    Reported to scent a seal under a metre of packed snow from a kilometre away.
    467pts
  11. Great White Shark — ranked #1111
    Great White Shark
    Detects blood at roughly one part per ten billion, with two-thirds of its brain given over to smell.
    343pts
  12. Kiwi — ranked #1212
    Kiwi
    The only bird with nostrils at the tip of its beak, probing soil for worms it cannot see.
    343pts
  13. Star-nosed Mole — ranked #1313
    Star-nosed Mole
    Sniffs underwater by blowing bubbles and re-inhaling them, the only mammal known to do it.
    343pts
  14. Rat — ranked #1414
    Rat
    Trained African giant pouched rats clear minefields and screen tuberculosis samples faster than lab equipment.
    0pts
  15. Salmon — ranked #1515
    Salmon
    Navigates back from the open ocean to the exact stream it hatched in, guided by the water's smell.
    0pts

#Nature45#Science25#Animals43#Records11

Comments

Courts have accepted tracking evidence from bloodhounds; a grizzly finds a carcass from miles away: https://youpick.best/articles/bear-ranked-many-ways

YP
ypb-team·9h ago·
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