Last October, the cover of the international journal Science featured a haunting picture of a bird in flight during a total solar eclipse. The story was a large-scale study of bird behaviour during the 2024 eclipse across North America.

Researchers using recordings and public observations discovered that 29 of the 52 bird species showed changes in their usual patterns of singing and behaviour during the eclipse. Some “dawn chorus” performers burst into song while others fell completely silent – only to erupt into a synchronised false dawn chorus when it passed, as if a new day was dawning.

An observational study of animals at the Riverbanks Zoo and Garden in Columbia, South Carolina, during the 2017 solar eclipse suggested that just 2½ minutes of near-total darkness was enough to trigger unusually anxious activity among the animals.

At the height of it the male of the gorilla group charged the surrounding glass. The giraffes formed tight huddles near the entrance to their evening barn, swaying and group galloping. All four Galápagos tortoises suddenly became more active, moving faster and dispersing in different directions.

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Afterwards a giraffe and a female baboon continued to pace around for an hour. The old Galápagos tortoises all gazed up at the sky.

As will we. Possibly. Solar eclipses are a celestial phenomenon that are not........

© The Irish Times