prime bird killer
A Varied Thrush just died on impact with a window in my home—not a happy event. It is embarrassing to realize that a couple of birds are killed by my home in this way each year. Multiplied by many buildings, this adds up to a substantial toll. It is estimated at about 22 million in Canada each year—likely mainly in urban areas.
Yet, windows are passive killers, they don’t actively roam the countryside searching out birds to kill. For that anthropomorphic source of avian death, one must turn to an invasive species: the domestic cat.
For a long time it was thought that windows were a greater threat to birds than cats, but a new study by the Smithsonian’s Conservation Biology Institute now places the annual number of bird kills by cats in the U.S. in the billions. Indeed, an earlier National Geographic study that attached tiny video cameras to household cats to monitor their activities, found that a substantial part of a cat’s outdoor time was spent hunting, with an average success rate of over two kills a week per cat. Yikes.
I don’t own a pet cat—a coyote made sure of that. Granted that best estimates now place windows as a far smaller threat to birds than are cats, that realization is thin gruel when one hears that disconcerting THUNK.
Moments earlier, this Varied Thrush flew free.
Very sad. This happened to us many years ago when living in Burnaby down on the coast. Two beautiful cedar waxwings flew into one of our windows and were killed instantly. We took them to the park and gave them honourable burial. We were quite heart-broken.
Try hanging used cds from filament [fishing line] in front of the windows. This has considerably reduced the window “thunking” at our house.
We had this problem for a number of years until we installed fine filament black netting completely over the offending windows but not on the glass. There is about a 3″ space between the glass and the net. They are also strung taut. We haven’t had a mortality since then and sometimes I think the birds enjoy the “trampoline”!
My sympathies Alistair. I, too, had a Varied Thrush hit at a former house. In the past, I hung up vertical strips of evenly spaced toilet paper from the window frame; looks quite fetching too – sure to be all the rage with the Cosmopolitan Life set.
great shot of the dead bird. reminds me of the encaustic paintings at the capitol theatre recently. last year, a male grouse flew into our kitchen window, breaking it and creating a large hole in the process! unfortunately, it too, did not survive. p&j