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The small family of starlings have recently moved back into their nest inside of the thermal insulation next to my kitchen window. Also animals are experiencing the alterations to city life caused by the pandemia. However, they seem to be quite casual about it. Alike many among their human cohabitants in Berlin’s city center, they have made themselves comfortable in a kind of “balcony situation”.

 

Not very long ago the population of urban starlings in Berlin had become victims of gentrification, suffering eviction from their natural habitats that often consisted of cracks and bolt-holes in old buildings, which one by one have been refurbished, insulated and equipped with rows of nice balconies for humans.

 

But the starlings soon adapted themselves and finally even learned to appreciate the comforts of modern living:

 

Perhaps individually, but more likely as a collective skill of the species they found out how to pick small holes in the plastering of the thermal protections of the newly renovated houses, opening them up wide enough to form an entrance to a birds home. This done, a comfortably padded interior space is excavated and fitted according to the bird families' specific needs and desires.