Flight of the Starlings: Watch This Eerie but Beautiful Phenomenon | Short Film Showcase

We know a lot of factual information about the starling—its size and voice, where it lives, how it breeds and migrates—but what remains a mystery is how it flies in murmurations, or flocks, without colliding. This short film by Jan van IJken was shot in the Netherlands, and it captures the birds gathering at dusk, just about to start their "performance." Listen well and you'll be able to hear how this beautiful phenomenon got its name.

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Flight of the Starlings: Watch This Eerie but Beautiful Phenomenon | Short Film Showcase

National Geographic

[ash]

I was in a busy airport car park once and an enormous Murmuration like this was happening about 200 yards away. Someone yelled "Look at that" and the entire car park just stopped in silence as everyone noticed it, cars stopped, everybody just stopped. Feeling the collective wonder pass through this crowd of hot and bothered, stressed out people getting off flights made me appreciate the power that nature has to inspire wonder in us, regardless of any modern day context that removes us from it.

[Molybdaenmornell]

The way they disappear at the end, like a phantom spirit, leaving everything else motionless ...

[libertyjo]

Sounds like ocean waves....really so stunning.❤

[lifeislyrical]

How they synchronize themselves is amazing.

[koshka]

Absolutely stunning...the only such film to capture the eerie beauty of the sound of the birds without adding a mindless soundtrack.

[hieronymuslarsson]

It's like a super organism that expresses its full life force in a spectacular dance. Utterly fascinating.

[ejej]

Spectacular video, especially the ending.
The murmurations are breathtaking while the birds are in flight. Another aspect that's remarkable is when the group decides to land. I watched a murmuration a few winters ago. I could only guess how many birds were involved - thousands, no doubt, but how many thousands I really couldn't say. When they landed on a field they literally turned the field black. There seemed to be not a spare inch of space.

[Bemabond]

This happens in my front yard literally every evening. Great show.

[anttam]

It sounds like waves crashing in the sand. Very relaxing and magical. It must be an amazing feeling to be witness of that.

[observeroflife]

This is one of the most beautiful things I have ever witnessed. A few years ago I worked at at this place out by some fields. Sometimes where I would park for lunch a much smaller flock of these birds would come and dance in the sky like this while I was eating. It was probably about a hundred to two hundred birds. It was a magnificent sight. 🤩

Then one day, a month or so after I stopped working there I was sitting in my chair and I heard quite a racket outside. I was like, what the heck is that?!

So I went outside and there were 100 to 200 starlings in all the trees surrounding my building, just a chattering away... It was LOUD. Very very LOUD. 😳 😂

Flitting from one tree to another. This lasted about 15 minutes or so, and then one of them took off to the south, and the rest followed. Which also was an amazing sight. 🤩

They have visited more than a few times. I haven't seen them since early spring this year. It seems they stop in to say hello in the spring and fall. So hope to see them again this year.

But things change, so there is just no telling. 🤷‍♀️

[shiaennals]

I was lying in my bedroom and a large wind sound woke me up and I was like wow it's some strong winds outside today ..then I was like that's unusually strong..and when I look out the window I saw the school of birds swarming together and designs and shapes in flocking around my house in my backyard it had to been 5, 000 birds and just a chirping in the wind from their feathers together it was beautiful I watched them until they were gone

[fungipolo]

well that field is definitely fertilized for this year

[gnawershreth]

This happens in Denmark (SW Jutland) every year as well, the starlings gather in the hundreds of thousands or even millions in the Wadden Sea area before starting their migrations north/south (They do it both in the spring and fall). While they're here eating for a while they'll do those "dances" that we call "sort sol" (Black sun) which attracts a lot of people since it's so cool/strange. :)

[GregFlores]

This made me cry so hard and I don’t know why.

[cuteblancaestrella]

Starlings are amazing and their "Murmurations" is still a mystery on why they do it.

Their recreations reveal that starlings maintain their fluid formations via a mechanism known as scale-free behavioral correlation, in which each bird positions itself next to approximately seven other birds, coordinating its movements to create an overlapping synchronicity.
Although each bird is interacting with its nearby neighbors, every bird’s movements affects and are affected by the entire group, allowing information to travel across the flock at a constant speed. The result is collective decision-making so agile that a signal to turn, usually initiated by a bird on the outskirts, can flash through a flock of 400 birds in half a second—a speed of 90 miles per hour.

[victorwadsworth]

I want to live forever because life always brings me something I never seen before.

[Balderhash]

I didn't realise there was a sound they made. They sound like the ocean.

[glec]

"This is another reminder that the universe has already written the poem that you were planning on writing"

[slywlf]

Wonderful! I have seen only relatively small murmurations in person, though I have seen some lovely videos. Most of the latter have either been filmed from a distance or been overlaid with dramatic orchestral music. While that might have enhanced the beauty in a way, I find I much prefer the thunder of wings and chatter of the birds! Awesome in the best meaning of the word!😮🥰

[adamkennedy]

I was once walking along the Tiber River in Rome when a murmuration began overhead while a street musician happened to be playing "Fields of Gold" nearby. Needless to say just about everyone stopped what they were doing and looked up. One of those perfect moments of serendipity and harmony. It was the most relaxing experience I have ever had.