Why do flies fly in small circles around the centre of a room...

[gettinthebug]

If you really have insomnia...... click http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6750/8/93

[Nabokov]

Anyway, the reason cats fly in circles around the middle of the room is because one of their wings is a bit shorter than the other. Case closed.

[jim_branning]

Why do flies fly in small circles around the centre of a room...

simple:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIcLotTEW1I

lol

[Emperor Fabulous]

The light thing is a mis-firing of the genetic intruction to use a fixed point in the sky to navigate with.

Moths are the perfect demonstration - they have have eyes that effectively have straws coming off them (not true compound eyes). As the Moon is at optical infinity it is a good navigation aid - the moth just keeps the moon within a certain straw and that keeps ot straight.

Alas the moth's navigation system has developed over hundreds of thousands of years and artificial light is very recent.

So the moth sees a light, assumes it is the moon or sun and then keeps that image in the eye-straw. As the light is very close this causes the moth to follow a concentric circle until it flies into the flame.

So - the behaviour is not at all intentional, it is just a mis-firing of a genetic rule of thumb that still works perfectly well in the absence of artificial light.

Fascinating stuff.....but what about flies ? Don't they have compound eyes ?

[BlindLemonAde]

Anyway, the reason cats fly in circles around the middle of the room is because one of their wings is a bit shorter than the other. Case closed.

"Waiter! Get me one of whatever he's on!"

[scrumhalf]

"Why do flies fly in small circles around the centre of a room..."

Simple. Air traffic control is very strict about the number of flies that can land on a curtain at any one time. They're stacked, and when the curtain's free, one of them will peel off and land.

[Pendragon]

"Why do flies fly in small circles around the centre of a room..."

Simple. Air traffic control is very strict about the number of flies that can land on a curtain at any one time. They're stacked, and when the curtain's free, one of them will peel off and land.

Spray 'Raid' on the blighters and they drop quite dramatically

[Novata]

They get a buzz out of it?

[Crotchet]

So no one knows then?

[Emperor Fabulous]

You know, it could be something as simple as; the light is usually in the centre of the room and this is the best vantage point to see everything. If you're a fly and on the lookout for food / people with cans of RAID - then your best spot is probably the light.
High and central.