“I call it New York’s shameful little secret”
Each year in the United States, up to 1 billion birds die in collisions with buildings. These birds, which migrate south from Canada, would be disturbed by the reflections of windows and disoriented by the artificial lighting of cities at night. “I knew window strikes were a hazard to migratory birds and that it happened in New York. But I had no idea of the extent of the problem”confides Melissa Breyer, volunteer for the “Audubon New York” association.
This bird holds the record for the longest migration
The metropolis is located on the Atlantic migration route, the north-south axis taken by migratory birds in North America. Regularly, volunteers from the “Bird Safety Project” travel the streets of New York to collect data on collisions. One morning, Melissa Breyer found nearly 300 dead birds. “This time, the collisions took place at night. I know they saw the lights, lost their bearings and flew low. If those lights had been turned off, I don’t think it would have been such a disaster”. When a volunteer finds an injured or stunned bird, they take it to a bird clinic. The dead birds are then bequeathed to museums or researchers.
40% of bird species are threatened with extinction worldwide
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