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Preventing Window StrikesThump! It's that sickening sound that can only mean another bird has flown into one of your windows. Birds cannot see glass, especially if it is reflecting the nearby habitat or sky. These reflections do not register as such to a bird. This is why millions of birds die or are injured each year in collisions with glass windows in homes and office buildings. Here are suggestions for making your windows less deadly for birds. Move your feeders. Many window-killed birds are familiar feeder birds that use our backyards every day. Move the feeders farther away from your windows or move them closer to your windows. The idea here is that you'll disrupt the birds' usual flight path to and from the feeders. Branches. Breaking up the reflective ability of a large expanse of glass is key to making it less deadly. A natural way to do this is to suspend tree branches in front of the most-struck windows. Try to do this in a way that will give good coverage to the pane of glass but will not eliminate your view entirely. Commercial stickers. There are a few products available commercially that are designed to reduce or prevent window strikes. One of these is a static-adhering sticker that looks like a spiderweb; others are various designs meant to scare birds away with predator faces or with bright metallic reflective surfaces. Feather Guard. BWD reader Stiles Thomas of New Jersey created Feather Guard. It consists of bird feathers strung about 8 inches apart on fishing line. These lines of feathers are then strung vertically across regularly struck windows. Birds see the feathers and do not continue to fly into the windows. Do the birds see the feathers as evidence of predation? Do the moving feathers frighten the birds? Nobody knows for sure, but we know from experience that FeatherGuard works. For specific directions, get your hands on the September/October 2001 issue of BWD and turn to page 98. Or go to: How to Build Your Own Feather Guard |