Since ancient times, people have been fascinated by one of the planet's strangest phenomena: the solar eclipse. On the rare occasions when the Moon passes between the Earth and the Sun, blocking some or all of the Sun from view, people have reacted in various ways. But what about animals? How do they react when a solar eclipse occurs?
After experiencing his first solar eclipse, Adam Hartstone-Rose, a biologist at the University of South Carolina, wondered what animals might do when such celestial anomalies occur. Initially, he figured animals would treat it as nothing more than a passing storm. He was wrong. Animals of all shapes and sizes seemed to react in different ways when a solar eclipse occurred. A new study published in the journal Zoo Biology helps explain why.
Eclipses are rare, but cyclical. Lunar eclipses occur when the Moon passes through the Earth's shadow and can be viewed anywhere on the night side of Earth for an hour or more, and they are safe to look at. Solar eclipses, on the other hand, are dangerous to look at directly. A total solar eclipse can be seen only in a narrow area, making it a rare event at any one location.
Surprisingly, there was little research on the effects of solar eclipses on animals until recently. In 2020, Hartstone-Rose co-authored the cheekily titled paper Total Eclipse of the Zoo: Animal Behavior during a Total Solar Eclipse. Its findings showed various anomalous animal behaviors during a solar eclipse: a colony of flamingos formed a circle around juveniles, giraffes ran off, and baboons huddled together. A Komodo dragon ran around its enclosure. The eclipse also seemed to trigger the nighttime routines of other animals, from birds returning to their nests to elephants heading toward their barn. Meanwhile, other animals showed little to no reaction at all.
The eclipse observed by Hartstone-Rose and his colleagues had occurred in a zoo packed with human guests, suggesting that the presence of humans could have contributed to some of the animals' strange behavior.
In a recent study published in Zoo Biology, Canadian researchers observed zoo animals during the 2024 total solar eclipse, but this time the zoo was closed to visitors. The Japanese macaques climbed higher in their enclosures, and zebras showed minor signs of distress. Otherwise, the rest of the animals didn't seem to notice or care.
Hartstone-Rose also conducted an experiment in Texas in 2024 to examine how the eclipse influenced animal behavior. While animals at the Fort Worth Zoo, which had a smaller human crowd, were subdued, animals at the Dallas Zoo, where there were larger crowds, reacted much more strongly. The comparison suggests that unusual human behavior may help explain some captive animals' reactions during a solar eclipse. As Hartstone-Rose told The Smithsonian Magazine, "We don't think about it, but animals at the zoo are perceptive of what's happening with the humans, just as the humans are perceiving what's happening with the animals."
However, some animals are directly affected by eclipses, regardless of human presence. A 2025 study published in Science showed clear behavior changes in some animals, particularly birds. Its authors analyzed nearly 100,000 bird calls during the 2024 solar eclipse and found that half of the recorded species sang their dawn calls in the moments after totality ended, as the sky lightened. Other research has shown that certain insects act as if it were nighttime when total solar eclipses occur.
Because eclipses are rare, it is difficult to secure funding to study their effects on animal behavior. Yet there does seem to be some correlation between human behavior during a solar eclipse and the behavior of nearby animals. A 2024 study co-authored by Hartstone-Rose involved hundreds of citizen scientists who recorded their observations of animal behavior during a solar eclipse. As Hartstone-Rose explained, "…what was really mind-blowing [was] that people who observed changes in animal behavior also felt significantly stronger feelings of awe and inspiration, and also stronger feelings of belonging in science, and that they contributed to science."
While more research is needed to confirm a definitive link between human and animal behavior during such celestial events, there does appear to be some connection. Hartstone-Rose said, "The animals that do the strangest thing during an eclipse, by far, are the people. I think that's actually an explanation for some of the anomalous behavior that we see in animals, too."