It’s time to talk about UIC’s dead bird problem.
Zaynab Hossain
April 14, 2023
During the fall and spring semesters, it is not uncommon for students to spot little birds on the ground along the outskirts of Douglass Hall or the UIC Daley Library. These birds are usually severely injured, or in worse cases, dead.
Needless to say, it probably doesn’t have the best effect on our ever-dwindling campus morale.
In a 2015-2016 study conducted by graduate student Alexis Smith, a survey across 20 weeks found approximately 200 dead birds around a sample of buildings on East Campus. Since then, the number has only increased.
So how is it that so many birds are unable to find their way across campus without getting injured or killed?
Bird Collisions: How do they happen?
One of the leading causes of human-induced death for birds is bird-window collisions which lead to injuries and deaths. Collisions primarily affect migratory birds, which is why the fall and spring migratory seasons (mid-August to early November and mid-March to early June) are when most affected birds are found. The UIC Office of Planning, Sustainability, and Project Management (PSPM) has a public prevention plan to address on-campus bird collisions in detail.
When a collision happens, a bird’s view and perception are so severely affected that it hits a window and suffers brain hemorrhaging, among other injuries. During the day, birds mistake reflections in glass for an extension of their accessible environment. Because of this, they don’t register that there is an obstacle in front of them. If the glass is fully transparent, this may also cause it to be invisible to birds. So much for a bird’s eye view.
At night, light pollution from urban areas attracts birds toward the light and causes collisions with windows. Chicago Bird Collision Monitors (CBCM), an organization dedicated to rescuing and protecting migratory birds, records that within Chicago alone, they find around 6,000 birds per year, and around two-thirds are usually fatal.
UIC Collisions
According to Catherine Oreilly, a biodiversity intern at PSPM, Lincoln, Douglass, and Grant Hall are the leading culprits of bird collisions. “It’s funny, because those were the first buildings that were designed to be sustainable,” she said. In 2010, Douglass, Lincoln, and Grant Halls were renovated to improve sustainability in terms of greenhouse gas emissions. They were built with newly updated windows to bring in more sunlight and reduce the cost of heating and air conditioning. This was the start of UIC beginning to implement more sustainable features all over campus.
“Truthfully, I don’t know if anyone had thought to bring this up at the time,” said Oreilly. “But when the renovation was completed, the bird collision began to tick up.” These buildings also are now surrounded by bioswales and rain gardens, or collections of native grasses and trees. These natural elements attract resident birds, which only exacerbated the collision issue.
If we take a look at an image of Douglass Hall during the day, we can easily see reflections in the glass, and transparency, both of which may confuse migrating birds and make them believe there aren’t any windows there at all.
While Douglass Hall is one of the most problematic areas for birds, it is not the only one. Hazem Alkhan, an undergraduate honors student, conducted a 2021 capstone project on this issue. He combined his data with that of Alexis Smith and created a visual representation of what parts of East Campus cause the most bird collisions.
Here, we can see that the Richard J. Daley Library, Grant Hall, the hallway connecting Douglass and Grant Halls, and the ARC are leading culprits for bird collisions.
Is there a solution?
There are many solutions to this issue, and they can be as simple as turning building lights off at night. Using motion-sensitive lighting or turning lights off in buildings after hours reduces glare and light pollution, helping to prevent nighttime collisions.
For daytime reflection and transparency issues, a glass film can be applied to windows to reduce window collisions. Applying visual markers on the glass, such as decals, can also help birds to understand where there is a window. According to Oreilly, however, window decals are not nearly as effective, because there are gaps between the visual markers. Architecturally, there are other measures that can be taken during the planning and construction of a building to prevent this issue in the first place.
UIC's response
Since 2010, there have been several people who have done studies on bird collisions on campus. In 2015-2016, Alexis Smith worked with the sustainability unit within the PSPM to produce a prevention plan that addressed on-campus bird collisions in detail, and give possible solutions. This was not, however, an official proposal.
Oreilly and Alkhan have both conducted their own bird-collision research on campus as well. In the fall of 2021, they collaborated on an official proposal to the sustainability board to use the sustainability fee towards getting the Lincoln, Douglass, and Grant Hall windows treated. The sustainability budget comes from the five dollars each student pays at the start of the semester in sustainability fees.
Ultimately, Oreilly and Alkhan had to resubmit their proposal a second time to finally get approval in the spring of 2021. Despite finally getting approval, the road was a long and confusing one, as long response times, and having to take the proposal through project managers and the PSPM, created obstacles and made the journey to this approval harder.
Even after the approval, a shortage of labor in the PSPM made it impossible to get the project completed in the summer, though that was the initial plan. Because the window treatments have to be installed in temperatures that are over 40 degrees Fahrenheit, the treatments still cannot be completed until May or June, when temperatures are consistently over 40. Unfortunately, the season for bird migration begins in mid-March.
The final controversy comes with the issue that students pay for the window treatment. Each semester, the sustainability fee paid by students goes towards a total budget, which is awarded to a different sustainable project per semester. This begs the question: Why is this funded by the students when it should be funded by the university?
“I think the answer to that question is just that everyone always says there’s not enough money,” said Orielly.
Because the students are paying a fee, there is a real, tangible budget that can be used to advocate for projects normally brushed under the rug due to so-called ‘money problems’.
What can a student do?
Chicago Bird Collision Monitors, an organization actively working against the effects of this issue in areas near Lake Michigan, has been called several times in regard to injured or dead birds on campus.
Many times, when a bird collides with a window, it is not dead at all but is rather just injured. However, foot traffic can kill an injured bird easily. Annette Prince, a representative of CBCM, spoke about the role of the organization. “We collect birds and transport the injured ones to rehabilitation, and document the dead birds and get them to the Field Museum to be part of the collection and scientific studies that are done there,” she said. “We look for birds in certain areas of concern in downtown Chicago.” CBCM has responded to numerous calls from campus and has worked with students conducting research on this issue in the past.
If a bird is found injured or dead on campus, you can call the CBCM hotline at 773-988-1867. If a bird is only injured, it should be moved out of reach to prevent further harm. A detailed guide can be found on the CBCM website.
Warning: graphic photo below
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