If you haven’t seen the “murmuration of starlings†video on the Internet yet, first things first, go and do it. It is beautiful and impressive and a testament to the wonders and glories of nature. It is also…how to put it…gratifyingly devoid of flying guano.
Now, then.
This morning, on my way to work, I had the great good fortune to witness a smaller, yet surprisingly similar Starling ‘Splosion out of the West Bottoms as I was crossing the bridge ‘round back of Kemper Arena. The teeming mess of starlings which populates the West Bottoms, colonising every power line, lining every roofline gutter, and pooping up an absolute storm beneath the Intercity Viaduct had taken to the air in a delightful ballet of tiny birds swooping around en masse.
My first thought upon witnessing the mass flight of little pest birds was, “hey, wow…this is just like that video on the Internet.†Except instead of being two wide-eyed English film students in a boat with a video camera, I was just a lone cranky Yankee office worker on a bicycle with no means of recording the phenomenon, other than writing about it in my blog some hours later.
My second thought (unfortunately) was, “Woah, the rain is picking up. Oh shit – that’s not just rain. Eeeeww.â€
Rain, even in Kansas City, is rarely brown-and-white and fibrous.
Fortunately, providentially, and uncharacteristically, I was wearing a raincoat today, so I didn’t end up wearing bird poop directly on my person. All the same: Eeeeeww.â€
I wonder if the girls in the boat discovered an unexpected and unwelcome spattering of starling poo when they got to where they were going. Probably they did.
Heh heh you said “west bottoms”!
Hee! I did!
It’s actually the name of a section of town – an old industrial district where the Stockyards used to be.
There’s an East Bottoms, too, also industrial, more slanted toward railyards.