What’s that Uncle Rab? I hear you ask.
Murmuration is a phenomenon where starlings congregate and fly in formation.
The RSPB describes it thus:
During autumn, dark clouds begin to form in the sky above fields, woodlands and reedbeds. But these are no ordinary clouds. They are one of the UK’s most incredible wildlife spectacles.
Throughout the autumn and winter months, hundreds of thousands of starlings turn the sky black around the UK. The birds come together in huge clouds, wheeling, turning and swooping in unison.
You can see this jaw-dropping wildlife spectacle, known as a ‘murmuration’, on many of our nature reserves and other sites.
The following footage, although it looks very like Loch Lomond, is in fact in Ireland in the Shannon system. Thanks Glade Rover for this.
Filed under: Quite Interesting Tagged: | murmuration, starlings
Beautiful. I once saw a less grand version of this in Bognor Regis of all places.
It’s worth remembering though that these birds wreak havoc on crops, especially rice, in Asia and are a devastating pest.