Straight lines rule in nature.
In Canada’s northwest, pipeline routes through the boreal forest make corridors for predators. For woodland caribou, wolves are always at the door.(1)
Summers in the South Pacific, humpback whales swim a straight line to Antarctic feeding grounds.
Guided by their own devising,not storms nor currents can push them off their course.
Scientists speculate about the means by which the humpbacks stay to such strict headings.
Whatever.
It seems, they say, the whales know what they’re doing.(2)
And then there is the Australian cane toad, the 200 million of them that have spread across tropical Queensland since they were introduced from South America in 1936. Their invasion of new territories is led by agile athletic individuals who travel outwards in straight lines as much as 100 meters a day. Soon enough others follow but researchers say the vanguard toads are themselves the offspring of adults who led previous waves of advance. Restless, perhaps feeling overcrowded, these forebears struck out for the territories in their day and appear to have passed on to the next generation a knack for getting to the head of the line. (3)
A familiar formula in other species?
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(1)Applied Ecology Wolves Prefer Running in Straight Lines
(2)NPR Steady As A Whale? Humpbacks Swim Straight Lines
(3)Europe PMC http://The straight and narrow path: the evolution of straight-line dispersal at a cane toad invasion front
Seeking The Hypotenuse 