The night is creeping on earlier and earlier as we rotate a little closer to winter. Walking home from work last night, the sky was all the colours of autumn – red, orange, pink. And diving through it all was the unfamiliar sight of thousands and thousands of birds, a murumuration of starlings trying to find a place to settle in for the night.
And below on the ground were dozens of people trying to capture it on their phones. The starlings had more luck than we did.
(I wish instead of trying to take photos of the birds, I had tried to take photos of the people taking photos.)
Just like if there were aliens arriving, we all stood and gaped and stared at the sky. I took out my headphones and listened to them, their constant chatter, the vibrations of their wings. What was that noise? I followed them along my usual route home, and I found that actually they had been following me. They started to dive and dive into the park that I walk past, thousands of birds gathering into just a few trees, for one giant slumber party. Must be a bit hard on the tree, I think.
And here is a much nicer picture of a Murmuration, taken by David Kjaer, and found on the RSPB website:
