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• starling
  starling

  noun

  a chunky, medium-sized European passerine bird, Sturnus vulgaris, of iridescent black plumage with seasonal speckles, that nests in colonies: introduced into North America.
• Starling
  Starling

  noun

  Ernest Henry . 1866–1927, British physiologist, who contributed greatly to the understanding of many bodily functions and with William Bayliss (1860–1924) discovered the hormone secretin (1902)

starling

¹ American  

[stahr-ling] / ˈstɑr lɪŋ /

noun

1. a chunky, medium-sized European passerine bird, Sturnus vulgaris, of iridescent black plumage with seasonal speckles, that nests in colonies: introduced into North America.

2. any of various similar Old World birds of the family Sturnidae.

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starling ² American  

[stahr-ling] / ˈstɑr lɪŋ /

noun

1. a pointed cluster of pilings for protecting a bridge pier from drifting ice, debris, etc.

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Starling ¹ British  

/ ˈstɑːlɪŋ /

noun

1. Ernest Henry . 1866–1927, British physiologist, who contributed greatly to the understanding of many bodily functions and with William Bayliss (1860–1924) discovered the hormone secretin (1902)

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starling ² British  

/ ˈstɑːlɪŋ /

noun

1. any gregarious passerine songbird of the Old World family Sturnidae , esp Sturnus vulgaris , which has a blackish plumage and a short tail

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starling ³ British  

/ ˈstɑːlɪŋ /

noun

1. an arrangement of piles that surround a pier of a bridge to protect it from debris, etc

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Etymology

Origin of starling¹

before 1050; Middle English; Old English stærling, equivalent to stær starling (cognate with Old High German stara, Old Norse stari ) + -ling -ling ¹; akin to Old English stearn kind of bird, Latin sturnus starling

Origin of starling²

First recorded in 1675–85; origin uncertain

Explanation

A starling is a small, dark, glossy bird that's usually found in a group with other starlings. Many starlings are able to mimic sounds such as car alarms. Aside from the hottest, driest deserts, you can find starlings just about everywhere on earth. When large groups of these sociable birds move in formation together, forming graceful, shifting cloud shapes in the sky, it's called a "murmuration." Starlings are also known for their ability to imitate the calls of other birds, as well as human-made sounds, including whistles, crying children, and car horns.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

starling Starling

It took two days for safari guide Kago Kanowa to find a violet-backed starling in the bush near northern Botswana’s Chobe Game Lodge.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 16, 2026

One of the birds was a mourning dove and the other a European starling.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 14, 2025

Royall continues: "These include schools of other fish such as goldfish or sardines, as well as flocks of birds such as starling murmurations and swarms of insects such as dancing mosquitos."

From Science Daily ● Mar. 25, 2024

Experts believe murmurations offer protection from predators as it is not easy to single out a single starling from a whirling group of thousands.

From BBC ● Nov. 21, 2023

Milkman did not speak; he watched her long fingers travel up her dress, to rest like the wing of a starling on her face.

From "Song of Solomon" by Toni Morrison

Mission controllers loaded a catalog containing approximately 20,000 space objects and their predicted orbits onto Starling.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 26, 2026

NASA's Small Spacecraft and Distributed Systems program, based at Ames and within the Research and Technology Mission Directorate, funds and manages the Starling mission.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 26, 2026

That computer, named Starling, is being targeted for 2029.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 23, 2026

Any pull-forward to its deployment for its biggest quantum system, Starling, “could result in upside in this case,” Essex wrote.

From Barron's ● Jun. 23, 2026

“A-a-a-h! She’s different. She’s the Great Exception. Can’t go by her,” said the Starling, grinning at them both.

From "Mary Poppins" by P. L. Travers