All species › Passerines › Rhabdornis, starlings and mynas › Common Starling
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Common Starling | Sturnus vulgaris
Spreeuw | Estornino pinto
The Common Starling is an exotic species in the guide area: it does not occur here naturally. After its introduction in New York in 1890 it spread across all of North America and from the mid-twentieth century reached Mexico, first as a winter visitor and later also as a breeding bird. It lives mainly around towns, farms and fields.
Voice
A varied, rambling song full of whistles, clicks, creaking notes and imitations of other birds. Call a harsh, descending shree; flocks keep up a constant chatter.
Recording: Uku Paal — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
20–22 cm. Compact, with a short, square tail, a pointed, straight bill and triangular, pointed wings. In breeding plumage black with a green and purple gloss and few pale spots; bill yellow. In winter plumage densely spangled with white and buff spots, bill dark. Juveniles plain grey-brown with a paler throat. In flight the triangular silhouette is distinctive. The sexes are nearly alike.
Confusion species
Brewer's Blackbird Euphagus cyanocephalus and the cowbirds, such as Brown-headed Cowbird Molothrus ater and Bronzed Cowbird Molothrus aeneus, are also black and glossy and often feed with starlings in pastures, but have a longer tail, a conical bill and no spots; they walk and fly less directly.
Habitat
Towns and villages, farms, cattle yards, fields, pastures and rubbish dumps. It feeds in flocks on the ground on insects and larvae and also eats seeds, fruit and refuse. It nests in cavities, including in buildings. In winter large roosts sometimes form.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
Native to Europe, western Asia and North Africa; introduced to North America, South Africa and Australia, among other places. In the guide area mainly in northern and central Mexico, with breeding birds in towns and farmland in the north; further south an irregular winter visitor, and in Central America only a rare visitor.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
In winter best found at cattle yards, fields and rubbish dumps in northern Mexico, often in mixed flocks with blackbirds and cowbirds.
Conservation status
Not threatened globally. An exotic species in the guide area. It competes with native cavity nesters such as woodpeckers for nest holes.
Scientific name
Sturnus vulgaris | Linnaeus, 1758
Linnaeus described the species in 1758 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. He introduced the genus Sturnus in that same work. Sturnus is the Latin word for 'starling'. vulgaris is Latin for 'common, ordinary'. The specimen the first description was based on came from Sweden.