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On a cold autumn day, Sophie Windsor Clive and her friend Liberty Smith decided to go for a nice canoetrip on the river shannon in Ireland. They thought it would be fun to film that day and decided to bring their camera along, not knowing that within days their to-be taken shots would amaze millions of people across the world.

The synchronous movements of large flocks of starlings are definitely one of the most aesthetic pleasures nature can give. Roaming the sky in immense numbers, these starling flocks remain incredible cohesive, often resulting in amazing formations.

The secret behind these swirling formations is that they are self-organized dynamic systems: in a flock of starlings there isn’t a single leader, but the cohesion and movement of the group is created by the massive interaction among the birds where each bird keeps track of the position of its closest neighbours.

As a large group, the starlings benefit from safety in numbers and can feed more efficiently, which may be needed during the cold winter months. Just as fish swim in shoals for safety, the tight sphere-like formations of starlings constantly swirl and change to confuse predators.

This video is absolutely amazing and one of its kind due to it being filmed above the water which gives the benefit of a much wider view and the birds coming closer to the surface. And the 4.5+ million people that have watched it since the two weeks of its existence probably agree!

For more photos and videos of the amazing shapes starling murmurations might have, see my other starling post here.

For you to enjoy on this rainy, windy autumn (already!) day, some of the best of Mudfooted’s favorite videos! This is the third in a series of nature video posts that feature the most interesting, fascinating, weird and beautiful videos on the web. Go to Mudfooted’s youtube channel to see my favorite nature videos! Watch Part 1 and Part 2!

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As you will know by now I am highly enthusiastic about animal curiosities and discovering our wonderful natural world. But what I maybe like even more is when animal curiosity is combined with creativity. Take a look at the fantastic photographs below and see if you agree.

A beautiful spectrum of colourful ants

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This guest article is by Wildlife Artist Robert E Fuller showing some of his beautiful photography of the amphibians in his own pond.

We moved to Fotherdale Farm in 1998 and one of the first things I did was build a pond. Now we have a very healthy frog and toad population – one time I counted over 80 individuals at the moment they were spawning.

As you approach the pond they tend to disappear under the water. But if you lie down they soon reappear.

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For you to enjoy on your relaxed saturday afternoon, 10 of the most amazing nature videos! This is the second in a series of nature video posts that feature the most interesting, fascinating, weird and beautiful videos on the web. Go to Mudfooted’s youtube channel to see my favorite nature videos! See Part 1 here!

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For you to enjoy on your relaxed saturday afternoon, 10 of the most amazing nature videos! This is the first in a series of nature video posts that feature the most interesting, fascinating, weird and beautiful videos on the web. Go to Mudfooted’s youtube channel to see my favorite nature videos!

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I simply had to share this amazing video of a dog dancing the merengue. Not only is it very funny, it is fascinating how the dog learned how to pull off this feat.

For more than three minutes the dog seems to successfully perform a line of dance moves as if it is the most normal thing in the world -- and all that just on its hind legs! Is the dog just reacting to subtle movements of its ‘dance partner’ with individual behaviours learned to perform in response or does it actually know different sequences of dance moves and how they possibly can be connected? Even walking on hind-legs for a dog is a very unusual feat that takes a lot of training, not even talking about the ability to walk backwards or sit just on its two hind legs!

Update: An important point was raised in the comments by Linda, that it might be harmful for the dogs hips to spent so much time on its hindlegs. I think indeed a dogs hips are not meant to bear the whole weight of the dog. I expect the dog has been trained from a young age which would mean that the dogs muscles will have developed in a slightly different way which makes it better able to walk on its hind legs, but at the same time it also means that the dog will probably wear through its hip muscles at a much earlier age. Especially since I think this breed of dog is more susceptible to hip injury.

An amazing image of the Kakapo, a flightless parrot from New Zealand, of which only 124 individuals are alive today. (Photo: Shane McInnes/TheWorldsRarest.com)

A large proportion of the almost 10,000 World’s bird species is threatened with extinction and more than 2,000 species need urgent conservation action to ensure their survival. With this in mind, last year the international photo competition The World’s Rarest Birds was launched with the aim to photograph the 566 most threatened bird species on Earth. These bird species inhabit some of the most remote and inhospitable places on the planet and even seeing one could take weeks or months.

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While this sparrowhawk scanned the sky in search of a feathered meal, it did not notice the great spotted woodpecker it hunted earlier was only hiding some 50cm below it! By staying motionless for tedious minutes, the woodpecker eventually succeeded to stay safe from the hawk-eyed gaze of motion.

Before this astonishing scene of hide-and-seek, the sparrowhawk already managed to pluck some feathers from the woodpecker’s back but was scared away before being able to give its final blow.

All this happened in front of the eyes of british wildlife artist Robert Fuller, while being hidden in his hide.

Did he do the right thing by disturbing the scene and saving the great spotted woodpecker? Or should he not have interfered with nature? I think in this case he did the right thing, since it enabled many people to learn something new about our natural world. What do you think?

In the tropical north of Queensland, Australia, a giant spider has been caught on camera eating a bird! Since Golden Orb Weavers, which can be the size of a hand, normally prey large insects, eating a bird much larger than itself is very unusual.

Probably the bird got stuck in the very strong web Golden Orb Weavers make after which it slowly weakened. The spider just had to wait for the bird to be weak enough to attack it and let its venom turn it into a feathered snack.

What a lucky spider, having such an easy meal for weeks! If only it’s web got not so messy…

A spider eating a bird caught in its web! Picture: {link:a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/3353693/Giant-spider-eating-a-bird-caught-on-camera.html}Telegraph{/link}

Sleeping insects covered in dew, that is the speciality of amateur photographer Miroslaw Swietek, who recently caught the eye of the international media with his stunning pictures. Armed with a torch and his camera he goes out in the middle of the night to search for sleeping insects. Swietek:

At 3am to 4am insects are sleepy and taking photos of them is easy, but it is very difficult to find them

Although the amateur photographer can get amazingly close, the wet blanket covering the insects bodies makes it sometimes very hard to find out what species they are.

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Due to people overfishing the worlds seas, not only have fish populations fallen dramatically, also bird species that normally rely on fish for their diet are strongly affected. On some islands off the coast of South Africa, its impact is expressed in the bizarre behaviour of pelicans swallowing gobblets in one go!

These gannets have the chance to be eaten by hungry pelicans...

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Yes, unbelievable but true, what you are seeing is a winged cat! There are even 138 reported sightings of these unique creatures of which 28 are documented cases with physical evidence.

Winged cats have been known to exist since the 19th century. Some sightings of winged cats may be explained by matting due to poor grooming. When the cat runs, the dense mats flap up and down giving the impression of wings. However, usually cat wings are the result of a genetic skin disorder called cutaneous asthenia, which makes the skin across the shoulders and back extremely elastic. Cats that have this disorder can often even actively move their ‘wings’ because they contain muscle fibers! Unfortunately, these unique cats cannot flap them in a bird-like manner.

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The mountain goat shows climbing abilities that leave other animals, including most humans, far below. Inhabiting many of North America’s most spectacular mountainous environments, these beasts live at elevations of up to 4,000 meters.

The crazy but beautiful Mountain goat

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Exploring the animal kingdom for its fascinating and intriguing species I was struck by the Baluchistan Pygmy Jerboa, one of the smallest mammals in the world. This species, only found in the hot deserts of Pakistan and Afghanistan, is said to be the world’s smallest rodent, measuring 5 cm long on average.

For the title of the smallest mammal in the world, it’s only competitors are the bumblebee bat and species of the shrew family.

Jerboas are a group of jumping desert rodents that resemble a mouse with a long tufted tail and very long hind legs. They are a great example of convergent evolution -- unrelated animals that develop similar characteristics because of living in similar conditions. In all the world’s major desert regions you will find animals that mainly use hopping as locomotion, a very energy-efficient way of avoiding predators when you have the space.

People have a strong tendency to like short faces and big eyes. The combination of it’s small size, large eyes and short face therefore make the Pygmy Jerboa one of the cutest mammals in the world.