Eli5: How are birds able to sit on electric fences and wires and not get electrocuted?

Question

Eli5: How are birds able to sit on electric fences and wires and not get electrocuted?

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Answer 1

They’re not touching the ground.

You only get shocked from an electric wire because your body is offering the electricity a shortcut to the ground vs having to keep being forced along the wire. A bird’s body doesn’t provide such a shortcut, so there’s no reason (or available path) for current to flow through them.