By Xeno
… a Dutch scientist, Charlotte Hemelrijk, of Groningen University, in an article in the online journal PLoS ONE, has proposed… that this seemingly sophisticated behaviour [starlings swirling and swooping aerial ballets that appear to be synchronised] can be explained using only a few simple behavioural rules. And not only are these rules true for starlings, she says, they are also true for other creatures such as fish.
In the case of starlings, Hemelrijk and her colleagues simply assumed that the birds are attracted to each other; that they move in the same direction as they return home to roosts after feeding; that they try to avoid colliding with each other; that they fly at the same speeds and that they bank when turning in the sky.
The scientists then created... More...
