Really. Just before midnight on New Years Eve, 5,000 birds fell dead
from the sky in a small area:
http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/01/02/arkansas.falling.birds/index.html
Apparently this happens more often than you might think. Experts are not
surprised. It was probably caused by weather. Usually birds are asleep
at that hour but these may have been woken up and startled by fireworks,
and then exposed to high-altitude hail or a lightening strike.
They were mostly red-wing blackbirds. What a pity.
- Jed
