I witnessed a murmuration of starlings in Washington from the rooftop of the Conrad Washington DC hotel property during my trip to a media roundtable by Hilton that officially revealed the latest changes to the Hilton Honors membership program.
Murmuration of Starlings in Washington. Sunday Morning Photograph.
No one definitively knows why starlings form these murmurations of literally thousands of birds flying seemingly aimlessly through the sky, as no one bird is a leader. Murmurations supposedly keep the starlings warm while offering protection against predators.
As a bonus, here is a raw video of the experience.
Final Boarding Call
Trivia time: This quote from Henry IV from William Shakespeare — “Nay, I’ll have a starling shall be taught to speak nothing but Mortimer, and give it to him to keep his anger still in motion” — prompted Eugene Schieffelin and an organization he led to import all the species of birds that were mentioned in the works of Shakespeare into Central Park in New York. The 60 starlings that were imported back in 1890 increased exponentially to greater than 200 million starlings today.
The purpose of the weekly series of Sunday Morning Photograph articles is to feature photographs from my travels around the world which you can view while enjoying your morning coffee.
Please click here for a complete list of the Sunday Morning Photograph series of articles at The Gate With Brian Cohen, which include photographs taken of nature and sights of interest in many countries and territories around the world — including but not limited to:
Albania • Andorra • Argentina • Australia • Austria • Bahamas • Bahrain • Belgium • Belarus • Bosnia and Herzegovina • Botswana • Brazil • Bulgaria • Canada • China • Chile • Colombia • Côte d’Ivoire or Ivory Coast • Croatia • Cyprus — including the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus • Czechia or Czech Republic • Denmark • Dominican Republic • Ecuador • Egypt • England in Great Britain in the United Kingdom • Estonia • Fiji • Finland • France • Germany • Greece • Greenland • Hungary • Iceland • Ireland • Italy • Jamaica • Kenya • Kosovo • Latvia • Lebanon • Lesotho • Liechtenstein • Lithuania • Luxembourg • Malaysia • Mexico • Montenegro • Morocco • Mozambique • Netherlands • New Zealand • North Macedonia • Northern Ireland in the United Kingdom • Norway • Oman • Panama • Philippines • Poland • Portugal • Romania • Scotland in Great Britain in the United Kingdom • Singapore • Slovenia • South Africa • South Korea • Spain • Swaziland or Eswatini • Sweden • Switzerland • Thailand • Turkey or the Republic of Türkiye • United Arab Emirates • United States of America • Uruguay • Vanuatu • Wales in Great Britain in the United Kingdom
All photographs ©2025 by Brian Cohen.
