{"id":237,"date":"2007-03-05T12:56:30","date_gmt":"2007-03-05T12:56:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/2007\/03\/05\/CuriousAvianBehavior.aspx"},"modified":"2007-03-05T12:56:30","modified_gmt":"2007-03-05T12:56:30","slug":"curious-avian-behavior","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/2007\/03\/05\/curious-avian-behavior\/","title":{"rendered":"Curious avian behavior"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Last November when Paula and I were in Rome we saw a fascinating thing: a swirling cloud of birds which, viewed from a distance, looked more like smoke or a swarm of insects than a flock of birds.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/pictures.little.org\/photos\/116392224-S.jpg\" alt=\"flock of birds\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Around&nbsp;dusk <a href=\"http:\/\/www.little.org\/paula\/blog\/\">Paula<\/a> and I&nbsp;were walking along&nbsp;the wall of&nbsp;Castel Sant&#8217;Angelo&nbsp;in Rome when we saw a massive flock of birds,&nbsp;all seeming to&nbsp;converge on the same location.&nbsp;&nbsp;The birds looked&nbsp;as though they were heading towards a plume of smoke coming up from one of the&nbsp;city&#8217;s parks.&nbsp; The &#8220;smoke&#8221;, however, was flowing both up and down.&nbsp;&nbsp;The best way to get a feel for what it looked like is to check out the video&nbsp;Paula shot with our pocket camera.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/109636977\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/vimeo.com\/109636977\">Starling murmuration<\/a> from <a href=\"http:\/\/vimeo.com\/reevesl\">Reeves Little<\/a> on <a href=\"https:\/\/vimeo.com\">Vimeo<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Swirling flock of birds in Rome\" href=\"https:\/\/vimeo.com\/109636977\">Video: Swirling flock of birds in Rome<\/a><\/p>\n<p>We still have no idea what was going on.&nbsp; Our best guess was some sort of feeding frenzy, catching insects which were coming out as the sun went down&#8230; but the flock was way up in the air and I think of insects as sticking closer to the earth.&nbsp;Perhaps there are some amateur (or professional) ornithologists out there who can shed some light on this.&nbsp; Or maybe I should just ask an Italian.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p>FYI: Castle Sant&#8217;Angelo is a huge mausoleum built for <a href=\"http:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20091030073633\/http:\/\/encarta.msn.com\/encyclopedia_761571874\/Hadrian.html\">Emperor Hadrian<\/a>.&nbsp; It was later fortified and used as a defensive position on the Tiber River.&nbsp; If you&#8217;re in Rome we highly recommend visiting the castle in the afternoon as <a href=\"http:\/\/pictures.little.org\/keyword\/castle%20santangelo-vista#117937493\">it provides wonderful views of Rome<\/a>.&nbsp; As sunset approaches grab a table at the little cafe located on the monument&#8217;s wall.&nbsp; If you&#8217;re lucky you&#8217;ll get one of the tables facing the Vatican and <a href=\"http:\/\/pictures.little.org\/gallery\/2189801#116393985\">get some great pictures of St. Peter&#8217;s Basilica with the sun setting behind it<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last November when Paula and I were in Rome we saw a fascinating thing: a swirling cloud of birds which, viewed from a distance, looked more like smoke or a swarm of insects than a flock of birds. Around&nbsp;dusk Paula and I&nbsp;were walking along&nbsp;the wall of&nbsp;Castel Sant&#8217;Angelo&nbsp;in Rome when we saw a massive flock of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,19],"tags":[111,127],"class_list":["post-237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-idlephotography","category-idletravel","tag-idlephotography","tag-idletravel"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=237"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.little.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}