How do you count a starling murmuration??

AndyorDij

AndyorDij

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Andy or Dij
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I have been going every evening over the past seven days to watch and photograph the starling murmurations at Barnsdale Hill on the edge of Rutland Water in Rutland. Being a regular i get asked various questions about them. But i am not an expert at all when it comes to birds or bird photography but i have another thread showing some of the formations they make.
The most poular questions asked are, 1 How many birds are there in this murmuration?
2 When will they stop murmurating and move on to pasture's new?
3 Why do they make the formations that they do?

Here are two photos from yesterday evening showing just a part of the vast cloud of starlings gathering overhead, probably about a third of the total there is !!.....one, two, three, four, five and so on!!.....Andy.
 
Kaolin said:
Can't help with 2 or 3 but if you cut and past the Starlings into a new image and then open it in ImageJ (http://imagej.nih.gov/ij/index.html) and use a suitable plugin such as (http://rsb.info.nih.gov/ij/plugins/cell-counter.html) it will count all the dots and spit out the exact number.
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Thanks Gareth i will give that a go!

The W said:
On pt 3: murmurations are an example of something known as emergent behaviour, where individuals following simple rules result in more complex outcomes.

http://www.wired.com/2013/03/powers-of-swarms/
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Thanks for the information Paul !
 
Could I just be a bit of a Mr Grumpy here and question the use of the word "murmuration"?

To my simple brain "murmuration" sounds like an activity involving some kind of noise. In my experience when the starlings are in flight, displaying or whatever it is, I'm not aware of there being any noise at all. It is only when they land in the roosting site that they start chattering away madly. Even that I wouldn't call murmuring in any way!

As for the verb "murmurate" - words fail me!:help:

Gareth, it's brilliant to know it might be possible to actually count them using the plug-in you mention, tho' I will still leave it for someone else to do it.......

Judging by what I see at Aberystwyth the starlings normally only go into those amazing tight flocks, balls and ribbons when there is a peregrine around. It would appear to be some kind of avoidance behaviour, designed to confuse the predator. But it is still very beautiful and mysterious all the same.

You might like to look at this blog post.........

http://wp.me/p2BFlt-lg
 
Yes you can be Mr Grumpy :rolleyes:
And yes they do make a noise if you have them go overhead at low level hence "Murmuration" :)
 
jerry12953 said:
Could I just be a bit of a Mr Grumpy here and question the use of the word "murmuration"?

To my simple brain "murmuration" sounds like an activity involving some kind of noise. In my experience when the starlings are in flight, displaying or whatever it is, I'm not aware of there being any noise at all. It is only when they land in the roosting site that they start chattering away madly. Even that I wouldn't call murmuring in any way!

As for the verb "murmurate" - words fail me!:help:

Gareth, it's brilliant to know it might be possible to actually count them using the plug-in you mention, tho' I will still leave it for someone else to do it.......

Judging by what I see at Aberystwyth the starlings normally only go into those amazing tight flocks, balls and ribbons when there is a peregrine around. It would appear to be some kind of avoidance behaviour, designed to confuse the predator. But it is still very beautiful and mysterious all the same.

You might like to look at this blog post.........

http://wp.me/p2BFlt-lg
Click to expand...

Hi Mr Grumpy, Neil B is totally right, when the birds fly at lower levels, the sound of thousands of bird wings and air/friction noise makes an incredible sound. It is more than a murmur, more of a roar at this "Murmuration" here in Rutland and there are many many witnesses to this sound over the past 4 weeks at Barnsdale in Rutland. Myself and a fellow photographer had the experience of having several hundred or more, fly past us at eye level, only feet away from us....That was noisy and he was recording the sound at the time!....."Slightly Grumpy"

Neil B said:
Yes you can be Mr Grumpy :rolleyes:
And yes they do make a noise if you have them go overhead at low level hence "Murmuration" :)
Click to expand...

Thanks Neil


jerry12953 said:
It could be that as they roost under the pier any slight :) noise they might make while in flight is hidden by the sound of the waves. ;)

To all intents and purposes, though, the Aberystwyth flock is silent until they land then it all goes mad........
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Thanks Jerry, yes they do go mad at the end!
 
I take your point. Any flock of birds would make quite a noise as it passes by at low level.

I've just got a bee in my bonnet about the word "murmuration", I think. It would be interesting to know where it comes from. I especially dislike the verb "to murmurate". It should at least be "murmur", surely....

Bit off topic though!
 
Also: murmuration - a low continuous indistinct sound; often accompanied by movement of the lips without the production of articulate speech.
: murmuration - The act of murmuring; a murmur.
: murmuration - The action of murmuring
: murmuration - a collective term for starlings

(various sources)

At least I shall be able to confidently use the word next time I go to France.
 
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