A dramatic aerial display in which thousands, sometimes hundreds of thousands, of starlings fly together in a tightly coordinated, constantly shifting cloud-like formation, most often observed at dusk before the flock settles to roost. Each bird responds only to the movements of its nearest several neighbors, and this simple, localized rule, repeated across the whole flock, produces the fluid, wave-like patterns that make a murmuration appear to move as a single organism.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
Murmuration is understood primarily as an anti-predator defense: starlings flock into large, rapidly shifting formations chiefly in response to attacks by aerial predators such as the peregrine falcon.
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