yourlifeisatrip

by Rachel Dickinson

by merlinprincesse via flickr common licenseThis time of year when I drive along the road toward the school – the road I know like the back of my hand because I’ve been traveling that road for fifty years – I always notice the starlings on the wire. As the weather turns and the nights get cool and the purple asters and yellow goldenrod fight for space in the meadows, the starlings begin to gather. First there are just a few, balanced precariously, claws gripping the telephone wire as they sway in the wind. But soon it’s like a party up there with hundreds of birds chit-chatting as they cling to the now-drooping wires.

European Starlings were first brought to the United States in the late 19th century when about a hundred of them were released in Central Park in New York City by a bird enthusiast who wanted to surround himself with all the birds mentioned in Shakespeare’s works. Today, hundreds of millions of starlings make their home from Alaska to Mexico making them one of the most successful non-native invasive species in North America (outside of humans, that is).

The older I get, the more I love starlings and their noisy, messy ways.