The European Starling Sturmus vulgaris is another of the birds in the ”It’s just a..” class. Even though its species name, vulgaris, sounds bad, in this context it means “common” rather than distasteful. I believe its beauty if under-rated. Close up photos with the sun just right (1588, 1590) show the beautiful display of subtle iridescent light and dark blue and purple with white spots below and orange spots above.
The remaining photos were taken along the estuary at Yachats Road State Park, Yachats, OR. I don’t generally think of starlings as shore birds but I found these all over the Pacific shoreline. These photos show two features rarely discussed for starlings – the brown molting pattern of the head and the pink spot beneath the eye (0372, 0373).