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Forecasting the Wild
What migrating birds, dinosaurs, and a few rocket-building starfish can teach us about uncertainty
It’s October, and the weather has changed.
Rain and wind now storm in from the northwest point of my compass. My early-morning rise is in darkness, with Saturn, Sirius, and Betelgeuse watching overhead. The days are getting shorter. The air feels different. And everywhere around me, the natural world seems to have noticed.
The birds are growing restless.
They sleep less and eat more. I see them gathering along the wires in masses, preparing for something I cannot see. Then they rise, forming long ribbons across the sky as they move south, toward some distant summer.
When birds blanket the sky in wave upon wave of beating wings, you can almost see the calendar pages turning.
I have always been amazed by their sense of time. Somehow they track the seasons, the shortening days, the changing availability of food, and the weather. Their bodies change too. Hormones help tell them that it is almost time to go.
But almost is the interesting word.
A bird ready to migrate doesn’t necessarily leave that instant. It may wait for the right weather or favorable winds. There are…
