Ryan Ginstrom <ginstrom@hotmail.com> wrote:

>> Animals are observed acting restlessly every day of the year. People
>> only assign importance to such things after an event such as an
>> earthquake, hurricane, or alien invasion.

> I remember one time, all the pigeons in the building next to me took off at
> once. A few moments later, I felt a strongish earthquake. It seems pretty
> obvious that the pigeons felt a minor pre-tremor that I didn't.

Pigeons are one of the animals with small bodies in their cells
containing ferromagnetic substances (obviously, predominately iron)
and actually navigate using them to feel the earth's magnetic field.

There is often an electric discharge prior to quakes on certain rock
strata, which may be what they, and other animals, feel. Interestingly,
should this be the case, fish would likely be the best "predictors", and
some behavior along these lines has been observed, though not quantified
yet.

Mike