The General Chat Thread (2025)

Morning Glory said:
Strange but I have never had this happen. I've lived in the country as well as towns. Is it for some reason more prevalent in the US?
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I’m not too sure, obviously most of my experience in this realm is on this side of the pond. But this article does estimate 30 million bird deaths in the UK due to windows: Bird-Safe Glass to be made mandatory in new buildings | British Birds

Most collisions go unnoticed. People often don’t see or hear the bird hitting the window, and birds will often fly away only to die later (as I mentioned above) or their carcasses are quickly scavenged by predators (squirrels will eat dead birds) so we don’t see them.
 
We get probably two hits a winter. In the summer, the screens are in, so they don’t have an issue with that, it seems (or they just silently bounce off, like a trampoline).
 
Morning Glory said:
Strange but I have never had this happen. I've lived in the country as well as towns. Is it for some reason more prevalent in the US?
Click to expand...
We used to get it all the time in the UK in one of our houses (rural), but not with other houses (rural or town). My Grannie would get the occasional strike as well (town house).

Here, it's almost a daily occurrence but the weird thing is that it is only ever 1 species of bird that it occurs with though it happens on almost every windrow with that species. They are especially dumb and how they don't break the glass is beyond me. As tenants, there is little we can do except confirm that the bird is OK. Sticking things to the windrow has not madder any difference. I think it is because that particular bird, Crimson Rosella, naturally flies between trees in bush land, so thinks it is weaving between tree trunks - seeing the daylight in the other sides. They do this a lot with one gap between buildings that we have, and that's there windows they're most likely to hit. It is a though it is a game with them.

20251209_083515.jpg

This is the gap, and it is not unheard of for them to fly into you as you round the corner.

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What i don't get as a human who doesn't 'do this' is why they don't fly 1m higher and just go over the darn roof!
 
JAS_OH1 said:
Never has happened to me or anyone else I know. Maybe our windows aren't clean enough?
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Trust me, my windows are not clean either.

The old ones had been washed once when we moved in 8 years ago, they were replaced April/May and the new ones were not cleaned by there fitters much to my annoyance and are too high at the far end of the house for me to do. And you can't get windows cleaners rurally.
 
SatNavSaysStraightOn said:
We used to get it all the time in the UK in one of our houses (rural), but not with other houses (rural or town). My Grannie would get the occasional strike as well (town house).

Here, it's almost a daily occurrence but the weird thing is that it is only ever 1 species of bird that it occurs with though it happens on almost every windrow with that species. They are especially dumb and how they don't break the glass is beyond me. As tenants, there is little we can do except confirm that the bird is OK. Sticking things to the windrow has not madder any difference. I think it is because that particular bird, Crimson Rosella, naturally flies between trees in bush land, so thinks it is weaving between tree trunks - seeing the daylight in the other sides. They do this a lot with one gap between buildings that we have, and that's there windows they're most likely to hit. It is a though it is a game with them.

View attachment 137923
This is the gap, and it is not unheard of for them to fly into you as you round the corner.

View attachment 137924

What i don't get as a human who doesn't 'do this' is why they don't fly 1m higher and just go over the darn roof!
Click to expand...

I’ve noticed every now and then very tiny birds will fly through my outdoor kitchen, sometimes while I’m in it.
Mr SSOAP said it’s because there are bigger birds, like Sparrow Hawks out and they’re taking the fastest most covered route out of sight.
So perhaps it’s for evading potential predators.
 
SandwichShortOfAPicnic said:
I’ve noticed every now and then very tiny birds will fly through my outdoor kitchen, sometimes while I’m in it.
Mr SSOAP said it’s because there are bigger birds, like Sparrow Hawks out and they’re taking the fastest most covered route out of sight.
So perhaps it’s for evading potential predators.
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They're the size of a pigeon though. It hurts when they hit you!
 
SandwichShortOfAPicnic said:
Sparrow Hawks are incredible killers. They’ll do a Magpie or a Pigeon so it’s still a possibility.
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We don't see many around here and there's plenty of trees to practice flying between. Every other bird bigger than a blackbird flies over the gap, they fly through it. And it is only them that hit the windows (I'm home most of the time).
 
SatNavSaysStraightOn said:
We don't see many around here and there's plenty of trees to practice flying between. Every other bird bigger than a blackbird flies over the gap, they fly through it. And it is only them that hit the windows (I'm home most of the time).
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Ah really is just a dumb bird then.

What birds of prey do you have?
 
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