Stop Birds From Hitting Your Windows While Still Enjoying Your View
Have you ever noticed how windows reflect their surroundings? The mirror-like finish that seems aesthetically pleasing to people can also spell tragedy to local wildlife, especially birds. When birds mistake a building for a continuation of the sky, the results are often fatal. According to the American Bird Conservancy (ABC) “up to 1 billion birds [die] in the United States” by accidentally colliding with windows. And those fatalities can occur in residential, educational, and commercial surroundings. Nearly half of the collision-related bird deaths occur during daylight hours at residential and low- to mid-rise buildings.
Why Do Birds Fly Into Windows?
Birds often mistake glass windows for an extension of their habitat. When windows are tinted with traditional reflective window film, the birds see only sky, trees, and open space. When a bird sees the habitat that it recognizes, it heads towards it without fear. Sadly, a bird cannot tell the difference between a reflection and the real thing, which results in deadly collisions.
Glass is troublesome for people, too, but the bird’s speed makes any collision serious because their bones are hollow, and their bodies are small. We’ve all bumped into a glass door or partition at one time or another, but visual clues, like door handles, help us avoid repeating the same mistake in the future. Birds lack those powers of discernment, so a pane of glass presents an omnipresent hazard.
How Are Bird Friendly Materials Tested?
The last thing any manufacturer wants to do is harm birds while testing a product designed to protect them. Tunnel testing allows companies to safely test panels of unprotected and protected glass side-by-side. A bird is released in a dark tunnel and quickly flies toward the lighted surface. A net catches the bird before it can strike the glass, and the bird is subsequently released. If multiple birds fly toward the unprotected pane, then researchers know that the protection on the other pane is working. At the end of the testing, researchers assign a “threat factor” number to the protective coating on the test panel. According to the ABC , approved products have a threat factor of 30 or less, which means the product prevents at least 50% of collisions.
Why Does Bird Safety Window Film Work?
One distinct difference between humans and birds is our sight. As humans, we see three color spectrums (trichromatic), yet birds see four ( tetrachromatic ). In specific, humans see light between 400 and 700 nanometers, but birds are able to see color in the ultraviolet range, which is 300–400 nanometers and undetectable to the human eye. What that means is that bird deterrent window film or anti-collision bird markers that contain images in the 300–400 nm range will only be recognized by birds. Humans will simply see a clear surface, whereas birds will see the pattern and the black and violet color and fly away from the window instead of into it.
