Jeff Schrank, age 11, of Hubertus, Wis., for his question:

HOW DO PIGEONS FIND THEIR WAY HOME?

Pigeons come from a large family that includes 289 different species. Only 11 of the varieties can be found in the United States while 24 make their home in Mexico and only three species are found in their natural habitat in Canada. If the birds are large they are usually called pigeons with the smaller varieties receiving the title of dove.

Certain types of pigeons seem to have a natural instinct for wanting to stay in one place. Man discovered this long ago and has used the birds for carrying messages and also for racing.

Homing pigeons, also called homers, have a most remarkable ability to find their way home from great distances.

In racing, breeders deliver their birds in cages and they are taken to some distant spot where the race starts. When the bird finds his way home  and he always seems to be able to do this  a leg band is time dated and determination can be made as to which bird made the fastest trip home.

Carrier pigeons are a large, swift species that have fleshy growths of skin around their beaks and eyes which are called wattles. They can be taken to a distant location and then used to return messages.

Ancient Romans used pigeons to relay back to Rome the news of Caesar's conquest of Gaul and later word of Napoleon's downfall at Waterloo reached England by pigeon four days before the fastest couriers could carry the news by ship and horse.

During World War I carrier pigeons were used where all other methods of communication failed. One famous pigeon, called Cher Ami, will go down in history for bringing help to wittlesy's Lost Battalion in the Argonne Forest.

Pigeons aren't used today to carry important messages since electronics have largely displaced them.

But many thousands of people continue to raise and train homers and carrier pigeons today for the special pleasures they provide.

Scientists tell us that pigeons do some navigation by the sun. They seem to have built in mechanisms for judging the time of the day and the angles and directions of heavenly bodies. Just what these mechanisms are and how they function remain a mystery. Evidence shows, however, that pigeons near their roosts seem to be guided by landmarks, and that they pilot their courses rather than navigate them.