RUNNING HEADER: MAGNETIC ANIMAL REPELLENT 1

Magnetic Animal Repellent

Sidney Boakye, Michelle Miller, Joaquin Valda

October 26, 2017

Dr. Ales Psaker

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Rationale

Animals like birds use magnetic fields to help them navigate when they have to migrate

to a different place. They have photochemical molecules that are sensitive to light and gives

positive and negative charges that act like the birds compass. These charges can sense the weak

terrestrial magnetic fields of Earth and allow the bird to know where north or south is. Scientists

know that if a bird senses a strange magnetic field it will try to move away from it. Mammals, on

the other hand, such as cattle and deer, can sense the same magnetic fields but they do not use

them for navigation. They can simply face north when resting or move along the magnetic field

lines when grazing. It is still unknown the reason to why these mammals have this ability, there

is no clear benefit to them. We plan to develop and make a device that uses magnetic fields to

affect animal's behavior, deterring them away from places hazardous to their safety. Knowing

how magnetic fields affect an animals behavior in nature is important so that scientists can

further understand animals navigation systems. Up to 11.6 million birds are killed by power

lines each year and about one million vertebrate animals are killed by cars each day. Our device

can keep animals from going near man made structures such as roads and powerlines protecting

both us and the animals from accidental deaths and car accidents.
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Hypothesis

By developing and constructing a device that generates a magnetic field we will be able

to manipulate the behavior of animals and steer then away from a location which will bring them

into harm.

Research Questions

How strong of a magnetic field can we hope to produce? It would be logical to assume

that a stronger magnetic field would perform better when asked to deter animals. The best way to

find this out would be first researching using the resources available to us, then testing in the

field. Another question would be, How do magnetic fields affect the behavior of animals? It is

crucial to understand this as it will help us better serve our purpose of protecting animals. If we

generate our magnetic fields incorrectly they may further endanger the animal or be totally

ineffective.

Engineering Goal

Our engineering goal is to design and build a device that will produce a strong enough

magnetic field that will deter animals from a specific area. This will be accomplished by making

a strong electromagnet that should have the ability to turn on and off at the will of the user.

Expected Outcomes

We expect that by the end of the research project we will have developed a working

magnetic field producing device that can turn on and off, and makes a field strong enough to

deter animals away from a specific area, and to further study how magnetic fields affect animal

behavior.
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Research Methods and Conclusions

Our device will be small in size and will contain two batteries and a solenoid making an

electromagnet. The batteries will be encased in a 3D printed box to protect from the outside and

solenoid will be attached to the side of the box. We are using an iron rod to increase the

magnitude of the magnetic field and we are going to start with two AA batteries. If the magnetic

field produced by this electromagnet is too weak, we will try different batteries and materials.

This device will be a prototype so it will only be able to attach to tree branches or simply be

placed on the ground. Later on it will safely attach to power lines and railings along roads. There

are no risks in working on the device, we are not using high voltage batteries and magnetic fields

do not affect us. The only risk this project has is installing the device on power lines.

We will use a camera to monitor the areas we select to test our device. First we will test

with birds, by set up a bird feeder on a selected area and monitor it with the camera to see how

many birds go to it in one to two days. Then we will place the device near the bird feeder to see

if the number of birds that feed off of it decreases. The device will be placed out of sight of the

birds to reduce the risk of scaring them off. Based on the information we collect from the camera

we will know if the magnetic field was strong enough to affect the birds, if there is no change

then we know that we need to try a different magnitude for the magnetic field. We will do this

test for two weeks if the birds are not being affected by the magnetic field. If the birds are still

not being affected at the end of the two weeks then that tells us that our device failed. Then we

will test with cows on a cow ranch. We know that they rest facing either north or south so we

will see if our device can make them face different directions. The camera will be used to

monitor them as well on a daily basis. From this we can test if the cows do face different
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directions or if they avoid the area where our the device is. If they do these then this tells us that

mammals do indeed sense magnetic fields.

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Bibliography

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http://www.hcn.org/issues/291/15268

Patent US5884426 - Magnetic device for repelling birds. (n.d.). Retrieved October 12, 2017,

from https://www.google.com/patents/US5884426

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https://www.livescience.com/32276-how-do-birds-navigate.htm

A. M. (2008, August 25). Cattle, Deer Graze Along Earth's Magnetic Field. Retrieved October

16, 2017, from

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/08/080825-magnetic-cows_2.html