So, when people ask me what is my weather theory, I tell them “rain makes birds suicidal,” which is a half-joking explanation.
You see, in the past couple of years, I’ve noticed a pattern between bird behavior and impending rain: on most days I’ve had more than one bird fly right in front of my car, it’s rained. When I say most, I mean at least 75% of the time I’ve noticed 2 or more birds do this the same day. Of course, it’s rained without low flying birds, too, which is just one of the many variables that makes this a not a science experiment, but rather a mere observation.
While I don’t actually believe that impending rain is making the birds depressed, is there any sort of scientific explanation for something like this? Perhaps something to do with atmospheric effects on the birds? Something is causing them to fly much lower than normal…
If this post is doubled, I’m sorry. I got an error message when trying to post it yesterday, and I couldn’t find it, but it could have posted…*
Low pressure brings in rain. It also makes bugs fly lower. (Lower pressure, and you have to flap harder to stay up.) Birds are after bugs, so they fly lower too. About car windshield height.
Or…
Birds just can’t stand the idea of getting all wet, cause that makes their feathers all itchy.
I think you’ve got it all backwards. All those low flying birds create air movement at ground level, which in turn sucks the moisture out of the upper atmosphere to fill the vacuum.
No no you’ve both got it wrong! Birds usually fly several hundred feet off the ground, where the pressure is naturally lower, right? So it stands to reason that lower pressure at ground level invites more low-flying birds than normal.
Little baby bird: Look ma, the air near the ground feels the same as it does way up high! Weeeeeeee!
We’ve had rain the last few days and I’ve slowed my car more than just a few times to avoid hitting a feathered friend also trying to get where they’re going to.
I’ve also noticed their sudden drop in flight and attribute it to wind shear of an approaching storm front. By the time you notice a change of birds flight, however, just a glance at the sky makes it obvious why.
I think a earlier predictor of rain to come is simply to look at the leaves on trees; they’ll “turn” long before anything is evident in the sky or notice any low bird flight.
Birds, naturally enough, are highly sensitive to barometric pressure and undoubtedly can sense an oncoming strom.
However, I am a bit skeptical that there would be a real causal relationship between low air pressure and birds flying in front of a car.
In any case, one would have to have a lot more information - i.e. the kind of bird, kind of habitat (woodland, seashore, urban area), timing of the activity relative to the onset of the storm, etc. - to even begin to speculate about a cause.