Blackbirds en masse, Palmer's

Yet another sign that autumn is upon us began appearing recently: the massing of the blackbirds, grackles, and starlings. I notice this just after the silage corn is cut at the big dairy farms near us, and at that time, the scattered individuals in the blackbird tribe start to come together to feed, sometimes in huge flocks, on the corn left behind in the shorn fields. These birds tend to hang together throughout the fall and winter—there's safety and food-finding efficiency in numbers—and occasionally, they'll leave the farms and move through our woods in a ceaseless effort to locate good things to eat. I spotted one small flock across the road a few days ago, but by the time I'd raced indoors to get my camera, the birds had mined the underbrush and moved on to the next stop. Today, on a trek past the bottomland farm nearby, I got luckier. The blackbirds were more than happy to perform, over and over, their version of an aerial ballet.