Wednesday, January 22, 2014

MURMURATION OF STARLINGS














Collective nouns fascinate me. I think there should be one for them, for collective nouns themselves but, I don't think there is...This week, all over the Internet, especially YouTube, Twitter, and FaceBook, and Vimeo:  everyone is fascinated by this short clip of two girls in a canoe who witness so many starlings flocked together over a lake, they block out the sky as they wheel and dip, in their seemingly choreographed movements. It is as if there are enough birds flying in concert at one time, their undulations cover the entire length and width of the lake for something like three minutes. I keep studying the configurations and realize the birds resemble pointillist painters' work, or delicate etch-a-sketch filings being tipped ever-so-gently this way, then that...always unpredictably and awe inspiring...and this many together? It's called a murmuration.



                                                                                                                                                            

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