500 birds zooming around

[The Flying Tench]

While I was fishing today just before dusk there were about 500 birds zooming around in the sky. It was impressive formation flying which made the red Arrows look like amateurs. Every now and then a new group would fly into the big mass and get caught up in their whirling and swirling around, and then a group would break off, and then about half of them would drop like stones onto a big tree. And then they'd fly off again!

 

I assume that in nature things are done for a purpose, and they were using a lot of energy - so maybe they were catching flies? Though in all honesty I'm surprised there were that many flies above the centre of Newbury!

 

Does anyone have any idea what kind of birds they might have been? I'm almost totally ignorant about birds. I couldn't judge the size as they were too far away. The shape vaguely reminded me of Swifts, but that may be completely wrong.

[les middy]

While I was fishing today just before dusk there were about 500 birds zooming around in the sky. It was impressive formation flying which made the red Arrows look like amateurs. Every now and then a new group would fly into the big mass and get caught up in their whirling and swirling around, and then a group would break off, and then about half of them would drop like stones onto a big tree. And then they'd fly off again!

 

I assume that in nature things are done for a purpose, and they were using a lot of energy - so maybe they were catching flies? Though in all honesty I'm surprised there were that many flies above the centre of Newbury!

 

Does anyone have any idea what kind of birds they might have been? I'm almost totally ignorant about birds. I couldn't judge the size as they were too far away. The shape vaguely reminded me of Swifts, but that may be completely wrong.

 

starlings going to roost

[gozzer]

starlings going to roost

 

Yup, starlings.

Here's some great footage of them acting just as you describe, John.

 

 

John.

[Chris Plumb]

Starlings John. In the Mid-80's I spent a number of weeks in the centre of Brum attending my Trainer Training. The area we stayed in had a couple of MILLION starlings roosting (It attracted national media attention at the time) - they were everywhere - every poosible 'perch' had a row of starlings on it - Quite a sight when they came into roost!

 

On a separate note - I witnessed an unusual sight on Sunday - well unusual for me - 5 Buzzards circling overhead in the same thermal. All seemed to be calling as well. Looked more like vultures circling over a kill!

 

 

C.

[poledark]

I have a short bit of footage of starlings, only a hundred or so, but they seem to come back to the same trees/bushes each year.

 

That vid was impresive

 

 

Den

[The Flying Tench]

That vid was impresive

Den

 

Sure was - even more than the ones I saw. Amazing that all the software for it is in brains that I guess we'd consider are rather tiny!