In a recent incident, dazzling artificial lights caused nearly 1,000 birds to crash into a bright building in Chicago and die. Such accidents are becoming increasingly common, and so scientists are beginning to examine whether we need to seriously reconsider our relationship with artificial lighting.
About 960 migratory birds were found dead on Oct. 5 in the grounds surrounding Chicago’s McCormick Place Lakeside Center, a large convention center made of glass panels, the Chicago Field Museum said. The majority were declared to be palmate and yellow-rumped warblers.
Most birds migrate at night, and artificial lighting can dazzle them on their nocturnal journey, causing them to crash into reflective surfaces or glass buildings. What’s more, this latest incident isn’t the first time the lights of McCormick Place’s glass-enclosed building have been blamed for the mass death of migratory birds.
“Every day during the spring and fall migration seasons, our scientists and volunteers rise at sunrise to look for birds that crash into the center’s windows,” the Field Museum said at X. “Collection data has proven that many migratory birds are shrinking in size due to climate change. “They also helped scientists demonstrate the advantage of turning off city lights to help migrating birds: Lit-up windows confuse birds’ ability to navigate and cause more collisions.”
Nearly 1,000 birds died after striking the windows at McCormick Place convention center on October 5: the most Field collecting efforts have documented in the past 40 years.
📸: Lauren Nassef pic.twitter.com/d0AvYmwSQW
— Field Museum (@FieldMuseum) October 6, 2023
McCormick Place has also acknowledged that this is a problem, noting on Instagram that they are currently “consulting with experts to determine the best options for both immediate and long-term solutions.”
Fittingly, a new study was published this week examining how light pollution poses a growing threat to migrating birds. Using weather radar data, scientists say artificial light is a key indicator of where birds will land on their long journeys. With city lights acting like glowing beacons, migratory birds are attracted to urban areas, risky places full of threats like people, cats, scarce food, and too many shiny buildings to collide with.
With urbanization and ever-increasing development continuing at full speed on our planet, light pollution continues to rise sharply, creating a noticeable impact on human and ecological health. “We don’t often think of light as a pollutant, but it meets all the requirements for what pollution is,” study author Kyle Horton, an assistant professor in the Department of Fish, Wildlife and Conservation Biology at Colorado State University, said in a statement. If we turn off all the lights tonight, birds won’t crash into (buildings) because of the lights. “This is an immediate and positive impact for the birds.”
The new study was published in the journal Nature Communications.
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