Help birds avoid pane-ful injuries

Window strikes can be deadly to birds, but there are ways to make your windows less of a hazard.

By Val Cunningham, Contributing Writer

Last update: September 18, 2007 - 4:43 PM

Nearly everyone who feeds birds has, at one time or another, heard a thump, gone out to investigate and found a stunned or dead bird beneath a window.

Birds and windows simply don't mix: Put a flying bird up against a sheet of glass and the glass wins, every time. (We may not always see the results. Birds often fall into shrubs and are removed by scavengers.)

It's not that birds are too dumb to get out of the way. Birds strike windows for several reasons. Sometimes they see the outdoors reflected in the glass or see through a window to the scenery beyond. Sometimes they're driven toward a window by a hawk or other predator. Many times, birds strike windows as they disperse from feeders.

Unfortunately, nearly half the birds that strike windows die. The Wildlife Rehabilitation Center in Roseville, the state's largest ER for sick and injured wild creatures, admits many birds that are victims of window strikes.

"The most common injuries are head trauma and broken bones," said Phil Jenni, executive director of the center. "We can repair bone breaks in even the smallest birds and some birds do recover from head trauma. Unfortunately, the severity of injuries sustained from crashing into windows is often fatal."

Some of our favorite back-yard birds are victims of window strikes, including robins, juncos, cedar waxwings and cardinals, even tiny hummingbirds. And the saddest cases are the spring migrants that have flown thousands of miles only to end up crushed below a window.

Luckily, there are ways we can lessen the deadliness of windows.

Birds often collide with windows as they fly to and from feeding stations, so take a bird's eye view of your home from the feeding area. Birds generally collide with larger panes of glass and those that are low to the ground. Windows that are highly reflective or are opposite a window on the other side of the house are problems, too.

Walk around your house and see if you have any "killer windows," then consider moving your feeders or visually breaking up an expanse of glass. (See details below.)

There are so many things that are hazardous to birds. This is one we can do something about.

Val Cunningham, a St. Paul nature writer, can be reached at valwrites@comcast.net.