We received a sad recovery report on the 8th January 2016 from Kathy Marsburg regarding a young Peregrine Falcon who had collided with a reflective window of a building in Brackenfell. This female individual was ringed by Andrew Jenkins as a nestling on the 7th December 2015, meaning this was one of her very early flights (see here for ringing record). Kathy told us that the reflective coating on their office windows has often led to birds flying into them, and that during breeding season many smaller birds such as Cape White-eyes and sunbirds have 'protracted fights' with their reflections.
Clear and reflective panes of glass/plastic used as windows have been claimed as the second-greatest threat to wild birds (after habitat destruction). This is because birds behave as if the glass is invisible to them, causing collision casualties and fatalities. Even when the collision isn't fatal and only stuns or concusses the bird, this leaves them especially vulnerable to predators [ref]. Despite the widespread occurence of bird-window collisions, this source of bird fatalities receives little attention in terms of trying to mitigate its impact.
Short-term solutions that can be implemented in your own home include covering problem windows in garden netting/insect screening, and moving feeding stations as close as possible to the window. This prevents birds from being able to build up enough speed to injure themselves if there is a collision. A hopeful long-term solution involves UV reflecting and absorbing patterns visible to birds but not to humans that can be used to cover whole windows[ref].
Although this is an unfortunate recovery event, all bird recovery records provide us with important info regarding migration, breeding grounds, distribution, and many others. Human impacts are also important to document so please report any ringed birds you may find having collided with a window to SAFRING using this link.
The picture associated with this story is credited to Riaan Jacobs and was sourced from BirdPix.