A Chattering.

According to most sources, the collective noun for a group of starlings is a “murmeration.” However, take the trouble to look up that term and you find that it specifically refers to the flight pattern of enormous numbers of the birds as roosting time approaches. I have only witnessed it once and that was on the approach to Carlisle after leaving Tebay, the site of yesterday’s Blip which I have just posted. I was sorely tempted to pull over onto the hard shoulder to get some photographs of the phenomenon but it would just be my luck to be spotted by the occupants of a passing police car.
 
According to the RSPB, there are a number of technically correct terms for a number of the birds including the delightful “chattering;” others include: cloud, clutter, congregation, flock and scintillation.
 
So here we have a group of starlings chattering away to one another as the snow falls about them. They are quietly chewing the fat while their lunch is digesting, having nothing better to do until they are hungry enough for “seconds.”