No.106 · Birds · Rare visitor
Rose-coloured starling
Pastor roseus
A pink-and-black starling from the steppes of Central Asia. It turns up in summer, usually among ordinary starlings, and is easy to miss until it lifts its shaggy crest.
When to look
June to September, mostly at dawn and day.
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Time of day
- Dawn
- Day
- Dusk
- Night
- Best time
- May to August for adults; September for pale, sandy juveniles. Check flocks of starlings on lawns and roofs.
- Where in the game
- Millbrook (garden and urban) and the Pembrokeshire coast (clifftop)
- Size
- 19–22 cm long
- Weight
- 60–88 g
- Population
- An average of 37 records a year in Britain; 182 in the 2002 influx and over 115 in 2018
- Status
- Rare visitor; Least Concern globally (IUCN)
Diet
Mostly insects, especially locusts and grasshoppers in summer; fruit, berries and nectar in winter. In Britain it eats grubs, fruit and garden scraps
Habitat
Breeds on steppe and semi-desert; in Britain it joins flocks of common starlings on lawns, roofs, farmland and clifftops
Breeding
Does not breed in Britain. Breeds in colonies in the steppes of Central Asia and south-east Europe, timed to the peak of grasshoppers in May–June
Field signs
- A pale pink body against a glossy black head, wings and tail, among a flock of common starlings
- A ragged, drooping black crest on an adult
- A sandy, pale juvenile with a yellowish bill that looks like a washed-out starling
Did you know?
- In Xinjiang farmers put up artificial nests to attract rosy starlings so that they eat locusts, cutting pesticide use.
- Adults and first-year birds arrive in Britain in a wide scatter in May–August, while juveniles arrive later, mostly in the south-west.
- It winters in India, where flocks can outnumber the local starlings.
Moments worth waiting for
- Crest raised
Among the starlings, one bird lifts a ragged black crest, and its pink flanks glow in the sun.
Photo tip
Scan every starling flock on a lawn or roof. When you find it, stay in the car if you can and use it as a hide. The bird returns to a favourite aerial or tree, so set up on that and wait for the sun to catch the pink.
Be a good naturalist
Garden birds are on private ground, so do not trespass or stand in the road. Keep the numbers at a viewpoint low and be polite to residents.
The law
All wild birds are protected by the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981