Making our communities healthy for birds... and people
Making our communities healthy for birds... and people
Millions of songbirds hatched in Wisconsin over the summer will fly south for the first time this fall, and Bird City Wisconsin and other bird conservation groups are asking Wisconsin residents to act now to prevent the migrating birds from colliding with home windows during fall migration.
The Wisconsin Bird Conservation Partnership is offering a free webinar to demonstrate three easy ways you can prevent birds from colliding with home windows as they migrate from and through Wisconsin. The webinar, which first aired Aug. 23, is part of the Stop the Fallout campaign.
North American bird populations have declined significantly over the past 50 years, and birds colliding with windows is a major threat. Research has shown that nearly one billion birds die every year in the US after colliding with windows, nearly half of them home windows.
Bird-window collisions can happen year-round, but research shows they are worse during spring and fall migration. The toll is greatest during fall migration, when in addition to adults, young, more inexperienced birds hatched earlier in the summer are flying south. Some of our favorite songbirds are most vulnerable to colliding with buildings. Here are the 15 birds most vulnerable to collisions with home windows:
Fix one window
“Birds colliding with windows is a big problem everywhere, and some people don’t realize their windows may be killing birds,” says Karen Etter Hale, who chairs the Wisconsin Bird Conservation Partnership, a collaboration of 180 organizations in Wisconsin committed to sustaining the state’s native birds. “This webinar is a great chance to find out what you can do to easily address one window that is the biggest problem for birds, and to take action before songbirds begin migrating this fall,” she says.
The webinar is presented by Brenna Marsicek, who coordinates Madison Audubon’s Bird Collision Corps volunteers, who monitor buildings during spring and fall migration to document birds killed in collisions with windows. Corps members work with building owners to address the most problematic windows.
Marsicek, also Madison Audubon’s director of communications, talks about why birds collide with windows and which windows are likely the biggest problem. She demonstrates three easy ways to prevent collisions: dot decals, a curtain of paracord, and using tempera, or washable paint, to make a design on the window to break up reflections. She also covers why some methods, such as using a single silhouette of a raptor or a few decals placed on the inside of a window, don’t work well.
Discounts offered
As part of the Stop the Fallout campaign, which features multiple events with and by partners and displays, manufacturers of two popular home-window solutions -- Acopian BirdSavers and Feather Friendly -- are offering discounts to Wisconsin residents. Both products have been tested and found effective by American Bird Conservancy. Details about the special discounts are available on the Stop the Fallout website.
Read more:
Photo by Corliss Karasov.
The Wisconsin Society for Ornithology is embarking on a strategic planning process and would like your thoughts to inform their work. Your opinions about the organization, about birding, and about conservation matter! Please take the survey available here: https://bit.ly/WSOplanningsurvey.
The survey should take 10-15 minutes in case there are some items that inspire you, and it will be open through Sept. 14. Individual responses are anonymous and will not be shared directly with WSO, as this survey is being coordinated through a consultant.
From the Birding Wire
Now that the summer growing season is on the wane, it's a great time to take a second look at your yard with birds in mind. Take it all in, and at the same time, remember your spring-flowering trees and the birds they attracted, and think about the flowers that attracted the most hummingbirds. Remember the tall grasses and flowering plants that provided winter and early-spring forage and cover for birds, and consider how you can improve and expand on your successes.
How has your yard measured up to your spring expectations for the summer months? Actually, the days of summer also provide a chance to make improvements for the weeks and months ahead while evaluating how bird-friendly your yard is today.
Even if you are happy with the looks of your yard, your surroundings, little improvements can make it more attractive to birds -- now and during seasons to follow. For example, if you’re in a gardening mood, it’s easy to add a few nectar-producing flowering plants or seed-producing sunflowers. Consider making a new mini-flower garden in the shape of a circle or an oval on the edge of other landscaping or even in the midst of an open lawn space. Maybe you will be enticed to repeat the process another time to make two or more new stands of flowering plants.
You can also replace plants that didn’t work out as you hoped, or that are out of season now. It’s also easy to permit lawn on the edge of bushes or adjacent to a tree to grow to full size and seed -- the taller grass will provide more cover, and grass seeds for birds too.
Another simple way to add bird-friendly value to your yard is to add a large decorative flowerpot or a trio of pots that you can display together. Or consider adding a spot of color with a glazed pot, a terracotta pot, or a painted pot with a Latin flare to fill with favored flowers or even a hummingbird vine.
It’s also a good time to reassess the look of your feeding station. Maybe add some color and decoration by surrounding it with a few flowerpots or natural elements, such as large rocks, driftwood, or other creative touches.
Photo: Rudbeckia hirta, also known as Black-eyed Susan. Photo by Krzysztof Ziarnek, Kenraiz, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Millions of songbirds hatched in Wisconsin over the summer will fly south for the first time starting in September, and bird conservation groups are asking Wisconsin residents to act now to prevent the migrating birds from colliding with home windows during fall migration.
The Wisconsin Bird Conservation Partnership is offering two free webinars on Aug. 23, 2023, to demonstrate three easy ways residents can prevent birds from colliding with home windows as migration builds in September and October. The webinars are part of a campaign called “Stop the Fallout” being led by the partnership, a collaboration of 180 organizations in Wisconsin committed to sustaining the state’s native birds.
The webinars are free and will be offered at noon and 7 pm on Aug. 23. Register here.
Discounts offered
As part of the campaign, manufacturers of two popular home-window solutions -- Acopian BirdSavers and Feather Friendly -- are offering discounts to Wisconsin residents.
Acopian BirdSavers, also known as Zen Wind Curtains, consists of a curtain of parachute cord that hangs on the outside of windows. Feather Friendly offers a selection of adhesive markers that are applied directly to the outside of windows. When the backing is removed, a grid of dots or small squares is left behind. Both products have been tested and found effective by the American Bird Conservancy.
Details about the special discounts are available on the Stop the Fallout website.
In addition, local groups are hosting follow-up events to give people a chance to see solutions in person and to ask questions of local bird lovers who have installed solutions on their home windows. A list of these events can be found on the SOS Save Our Songbirds website.
North American birds at risk
North American bird populations have declined significantly over the past 50 years, and birds colliding with windows is a major threat. Research has shown that nearly one billion birds die every year in the US after colliding with windows, nearly half of them home windows.
Such collisions can happen year-round, but research shows they are worse during spring and fall migration. The toll is greatest during fall migration for two reasons: Not only are adults flying south, but young, less experienced birds hatched earlier in the summer are making their first journeys.
“Birds colliding with windows is a big problem everywhere, and some people don’t realize their windows may be killing birds,” says Karen Etter Hale, who chairs the Wisconsin Bird Conservation Partnership. “These webinars are a great chance to find out what you can easily do to address one window that is the biggest problem for birds, and to take action before songbirds begin migrating this fall.”
The webinars will be presented by Brenna Marsicek, coordinator of Madison Audubon’s volunteer Bird Collision Corps, which monitors buildings in the Madison area during spring and fall migration to document birds killed in collisions with windows. Corps members work with building owners to address the deadliest windows for birds.
Marsicek, who also serves as Madison Audubon’s director of communications, will talk about why birds collide with windows and which windows are likely the biggest problem. She'll demonstrate three easy ways to prevent collisions: dot decals, a curtain of paracord, and using tempera, or washable paint, to make designs on windows to break up reflections. She'll also cover why some methods, such as placing a single silhouette of a raptor or a few decals on the inside of a window, don't work well.
The webinar will be offered twice on Aug. 23, 2023: at noon and 7 pm. Register today!
Learn more:
Register for the webinars here
Bird Collision Corps, Madison Audubon
Wisconsin Bird Conservation Partnership
We're happy to announce that Bird City Wisconsin is joining with Bird City programs in eight other states and in Colombia and Mexico in the Bird City Network. You can find the network at https://birdcity.org. Bird City Wisconsin's new home in the network will soon be at https://birdcity.org/wisconsin.
Just as birds' annual movements carry them across borders, the new site will allow you to meet, network, and collaborate with program leaders across the continent. We're excited to see what comes of the cross-border socializing and information sharing the site makes possible -- for the birds' sake primarily, but for your sake and ours, too.
We hope you agree that the new site is better looking and easier to use than our present site. We're especially excited that the Bird City Network site will allow community leads to extend editing privileges to other team members, so the responsibility for updating pages will no longer have to be shouldered by a single hard-working soul. On the new site, you can form a team, share access privileges, and divvy up the work. Another benefit: You will be able to set and reset your own passwords.
We think you'll also like the new About, Tourism, and Events sections that you will be able to create and update for your community. Use them to put your hometown on the map -- literally! Promote upcoming events that make your community bird-friendly and fun for tourists, and tell the world about the birding hotspots, inns, restaurants, and other features that make your Bird City a great tourism destination.
As you might imagine, attempting to manage Bird City programs from many different states and countries on a single website with a single operating system necessarily required a few tweaks to be made to certain programs, ours included.
The most significant change you’ll notice concerns the number of Bird City Wisconsin's categories. Instead of six, on the new site you will find only four: "Habitat," "Threats to Birds," "Education and Engagement," and "Sustainability." But no actions were done away with. The pair of actions formerly listed under "World Migratory Bird Day" (Cat. 6), for example, are moving to "Education and Engagement," while those formerly under "Community Forest Management" (Cat. 2) will now be found under "Habitat." We'll send details about other tweaks later this summer.
Rest assured, the adjustments won't require you to do any extra work. We will migrate all your previous application material to the new system for you, including matching past criteria to the updated action list.
In the meantime, a request: Now more than ever, it's essential that we have up-to-date contact information for you and your team members. Please send this to us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Next year's renewal process will take place on the new site, and we want you to be ready!
Read more:
Bird City Wisconsin on the Bird City Network