Hungry flocks of birds were so large they showed up on weather radar in Georgia
Groups of hungry birds on their way to hunt insects showed up on a weather radar in Georgia.
The National Weather Service’s Atlanta office posted a photo on Twitter of two so-called “roost rings” spotted Monday morning — one over Troup County and one mostly over Sumter, Webster, Terrell and Lee counties
The “donut-shaped” pattern occurs when thousands of birds leave their roosting site at the same time and fly away in different directions to forage for bugs around dawn, according to the NWS.
Multiple species of birds are “known to gather at large communal roosting sites” leading up to fall migration and are often picked up by Doppler radar, the weather service says.
“The birds are detected by radar until they fly above or below the radar beam & are not able to be detected,” the weather service tweeted.
Some bird species will return to the same roosting sites, which are usually near water, each evening.
“As a result, the roost rings are often observed in the same locations on radar over the course of several mornings,” the NWS says.
This story was originally published July 12, 2021 at 4:15 PM with the headline "Hungry flocks of birds were so large they showed up on weather radar in Georgia."
