Hunting the Foreigners

Greg Mousely minking, June 2003

The latest news from Scientific American is that non-native wildlife in Europe wreaks $16 billion a year in damage.

Not said:  Foreign fauna provides considerable sport in the UK and across Europe.

Among the introductions to the U.K.:

• The Brown or Norwegian Rat, which arrived around 1720.
• The Grey Squirrel which arrived around 1870.
• The Sika Deer which arrived around 1870.
• The Chinese Muntjac Deer which arrived around 1940.
• The Mink, which was released around 1950.
• The Rabbit which was introduced by the Romans (or perhaps the Normans) around 1000.
• Fallow Deer which were introduced by the Normans around 1200.
• The Muskrat which was introduced around 1927.
• The Red-necked Wallaby which was introduced around 1940 (and is uncommon)
• The Coypu or Nutria, which was introduced around 1944 and wiped out by 1988.

In the U.S., most of the animals we commonly hunt and fish are native, with the exception of pheasants, some species of grouse, brown trout, and (of course) almost all the red fox.

The brown or "Norwegian" rat provides terrier sport for some folks, as does the nutria in areas where better quarry is scarce on the ground.

The raccoon can be thought of as a recently introduced species west of Ohio, and north of the Southern Great Lakes.

Many of our most common urban birds are foreign, including starlings, english sparrows, and the common pigeon (aka the Rock Dove).

Our hedgerow are choked with foreign invasive plant species, such as honeysuckle, kudzu and, of course, multiflora rose. This last plant was widely planted after the Great Depression in order to slow erosion in the South, but it also naturalized from abandoned gardens (multiflora rose is the root stock that most of our ornamental roses are grafted on to).

The dandelion is an immigrant ("dent de lion" means "teeth of the lion" and refers to the serrated edges of the leaves) as is Tumble Weed (aka Russian thistle) and, of course, the wild horse and mule.

Our forests, of course, have been decimated by invasive species from the chestnut blight which wiped out our most magnificent Eastern timber and mast-food tree, to dogwood blight which is now doing the same to our most beautiful native flowering tree.

The gypsy moth was introduced to this country by a Frenchman trying to start a silkworm industry, while the newly introduced ash borer beetle may decimate one of our very best sources of clear hardwood.

All in all, relatively few introduced mammals have "made it" in America, as compared to the U.K., and many of the plants, bugs, birds and pestilents that have made it over here have had an entirely negative impact.
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Shakespeare in the Park

Starling on fence post showing the distinctive "star" markings that give the bird its name.

Starlings flocking on a warm road in rural Virginia on a cold morning.

Repost from 2005

When out with the dogs in winter, we often see large flocks of starlings, often with cowbirds and blackbirds mixed in, winging down to settle on cut-over corn fields and soy rakes, huddled on the lee side of shed roofs, and even settling on roads in order to make use of the warmth radiating up from the black tarmac.

Believe it or not, the more than 200 million European Starlings found in North America today are direct descendents of approximately 100 birds introduced into New York City's Central Park sometime in the early 1890s.

Sturnus vulgaris owes its presence in this hemisphere to an odd little New York City group called the "American Acclimatization Society" which was dedicated to introducing all of the birds mentioned in William Shakespeare's works into Central Park. Previous attempts to introduce Starlings in the Northeast, Midwest and on the West Coast had failed, but the 1890 release was spectacularly successful, as today's massive winter flocks attest.

You rarely see massive flocks of starlings in the Spring and Summer. During these times of year Starlings are far more solitary, seeking out hollow trees, ledges and building eaves in which to construct their nests.

As a general rule Starlings avoid woodlands, deserts and open grassland, prefering man-altered environments such as cities, suburbs and grassy freeway medians where they can forage for bugs, seeds, berries, and insects.

In Europe the Starling is a migratory bird that forms large winter flocks bound for North Africa. When transported to the U.S., however, the Starling seems to have lost its bearings. Where, exactly, is is supposed to be migrating to? It does not know.

On the East Coast of the U.S., Starlings form winter flocks up to a hundred-thousand birds strong, but these flocks often travel just 50 to 200 miles before settling back down again.

No climate improvement is achieved over such a short distance, but a vague genetic itch has been scratched, and the birds seem to be no worse the wear for overwintering close to home.

Starlings in the Midwest migrate much farther south than those on the East Coast, probably because some individuals were blown farther south during winter storms and learned a migration routes back north by following blackbirds up from Louisiana and Mississippi in the Spring.
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A Vulgarity of Starlings?

A hawk hunts a flock of panicked starlings.

What, exactly, do we call the massive flocks of starlings we see so often this time of year?

Surely such a thing already has a poetic phrase attached to it? After, all almost every group of animals does:

• It's a paddle of ducks and a flock of seagulls.
• It's a skulk of foxes and a cry of hounds.
• It's a lamentation of swans and a charm of hummingbirds.
• It's an unkindness of ravens and a murder of crows.
• It's a mob of kangaroos and a pride of lions.
• It's a school of fish and a pod of whales.
• It's an aerie of eagles and a wake of buzzards.
• It's a flight of cormorants and a mob of emus.
• It's a mischief of rats and a clutter of cats.
• It's a charm of finches and a hedge of herons.
• It's a husk of hares and a trip of goats.
• It's a band of gorillas and a troop of monkeys.
• It's a deceit of lapwings and an ascension of meadow larks.
• It's a burden of mules and a drove of ox.
• It's a descent of woodpeckers and a kettle of hawks.
• It's an ambush of tigers and a gang of weasels.
• It's a bale of turtles and a knot of toads.
• It's a dray of squirrels and a surfeit of skunks.
• It's a business of ferrets and an array of hedgehogs.
• It's a rookery of albatrosses and a tiding of magpies.
• It's a coalition of cheetahs and a leap of leopards.
• It's a route of coyotes and a packs of wolves.
• It's a cast of merlins and a scold of blue jays.
• It's a ridicule of mockingbirds and an ostentation of peacocks.
• It's a labor of moles and a richness of martens.
• It's a raft of pelicans and a covey of pheasants.
• It's a bloat of hippopotamus a crash of rhinoceros.
• It's a cackle of hyenas and a shiver of sharks.
• It's a flight of pigeons and a wing of plovers.
• It's a clan of badgers and a nursery of raccoons.
• It's a cloud of flies and a swarm of bees.
• It's a circus of puffins and a flush of quail.
• It's a regiment of flamingos and a huddle of penguins.
• It's a sounder of boar and an army of frogs.
• It's a congregation of plovers and a walk of snipes.
• It's an intrusion of cockroaches and smack of jellyfish.
• It's a piteousness of doves and an exaltation of larks.
  

So what is a huge group of Starlings called?

I would propose a vulgarity of starlings -- a term lifted wholecloth from their Latin name -- Sturnus vulgaris.
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