Birds in a migrating flock might look like young children engaged in parallel play or like readers in a Silent Book Club, with each individual focused on a solitary task while in close physical proximity to others. However, new research shows that migrating bird flocks are actually complex, mutually beneficial social networks.
The study was published last summer and utilized up to 23 years of bird banding data. The researchers sifted through half a million North American records of 50 bird species with a community ecology lens and used social network analysis methods.
They found that birds create long-lasting inter-species relationships that are ecologically meaningful.
Like any social network, some relationships within the migrating community were found to be deeper than others -- relationships were often stronger among more closely related species that exhibited similar foraging behaviors and nonbreeding ranges. Some species also seemed to act as hubs with more connections to other species (“eigenvector centralities” in the scientific lingo), and some formed strong pair affinities. Species they noted as being among the most socially connected were Magnolia Warbler, American Redstart and Chestnut-sided Warblers.