Starlings fall dead from sky (England)
Scores of starlings started to fall out of the sky over one house in Coxley, near Wells in Somerset, on Sunday evening.
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The deaths all occurred at the same time, and the bodies of the birds covered an area of 12 square feet.
All the birds had blood coming out of their beaks, and their feet curled up as if in agony.
The birds fell in the front garden of Julie Knight.
She said: "One of my neighbours saw them. They seemed to just fall out of the sky. About 70 were dead straight away.
"We called out the RSPCA and their animal welfare officer took a few away in cages and euthanised the rest.
"There must have been over 100 birds in total. I've been a country girl all my life and I've never seen anything like it."
Some of the bodies fell into the boughs of a tree and some surviving birds perched there as well. After having the incident described to him, Lloyd Scott, from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, said: "This is one of the oddest things I've ever heard about. We've never come across anything similar."
He said it was unlikely the birds had flown into each other hard enough to cause the deaths.
"Starlings have natural habits and behaviour – when flying around in a murmuration they relate each movement to the seven birds closest to them. They are hardwired into doing this and on instinct they stay away from each other."
Initially, Mr Scott thought that the birds might have flown into a glass conservatory while taking part in a murmuration – the apparently coordinated sky- dance of the starlings that takes place on nearby Shapwick Moor.
But Mrs Knight said that the birds had not flown into anything – they simply fell out of the sky and into the garden.
The RSPCA are carrying out tests to try to find out the cause of the deaths.
March 11, 2010