Expert Says Glass Is Major Threat to Birds

dlkf writes "According this AP article, 'Glass is ubiquitous and it's indiscriminate, killing the fit and the unfit... estimates (are) that collisions with glass kill up to 1 billion birds a year in the United States alone.' First wind turbines and now glass. What will they come up with next..."

Comments

Legislation is the answer

[Catskul]

Ban Glass !
The greedy Glass manufacturing Corperations are out to ruin our envrionment !.

Birds?

[Captain Splendid]

What about people? Doesn't everybody here have at least one relative/friend who this has happened to?

In any event, this doesn't affect me. My cats will take down anything within a 100-ft radius of the house, so my windows stay thud-free.

Re:not much can be done about this

[cujo_1111]

Do you have anything to stop the kangaroos too? :)

Birds and windows

[moorhens]

First, a billion birds sounds like an over-estimate, but even if it isn't it probably won't make any serious difference to any bird populations. Every year, most birds die, which is why they need to raise lots of young to keep going at all. Previous studies of birds vs windows, birds vs traffic, birds vs cats generally show that those that die are effectively part of the natural surplus rather than this being new deaths. Not much comfort for the individual bird, but hey.

Secondly, most birds that conservationists (and yes, we are as scientific and geeky as the average /. er) are really worried about don't live in built-up areas so the impact with glass is likely to be less of a problem.

Thirdly, window stickers (especially those shaped like a hawk) can sharply reduce the level of impacts especially against windows that look like a fly-through to somewhere else.

And finally, when you find a bird that hit a window, someone will say it's broken its neck. Not so. Birds' necks are much longer and more flexible than most people realise until they see a lolling corpse. The commonest cause of death against a window is brain haemorrage.

Re:and killing birds is bad... why?

[ocelotbob]

I dunno. I love birds. A little bbq sauce, an open flame, delicious.

Another reason not to use Windows!

[Ron Bennett]

..."smart" birds avoid running Windows ;)

Ron

Poem

[joebok]

From Pale Fire by V. Nabokov:

I was the shadow of the waxwing slain
By the false azure in the windowpane;
I was the smudge of ashen fluff--and I
Lived on, flew on, in the reflected sky.
And from the inside, too, I'd duplicate
Myself, my lamp, an apple on a plate:
Uncurtaining the night, I'd let dark glass
Hang all the furniture above the grass,
And how delightful when a fall of snow
Covered my glimpse of lawn and reached up so
As to make chair and bed exactly stand
Upon that snow, out in that crystal land!


Great book!