Why do birds fly into windows?

Kat - I think he's little bird brained! Now, birds do fly into windows. At home, my Mum has a lot of bird outlines stuck against the window to stop them flying into them. They fly into them for various reasons. Firstly, it's clear glass - they might not see it's there. They might think, "Ooh! That looks like a nice room, maybe a bit of floral wallpaper..." Bang! Straight into the window. So if you do have big patio doors, it's quite good to put stickers or something on them. The other thing is that the birds may be seeing their own reflection and, as it is the time of year when birds maybe get a little bit frisky, they start fighting with each other. Maybe it's a male bird, and it will start fighting with male birds or trying to mate with lady birds. So perhaps...

Chris - Surely they should mate with feathered birds because lady birds are insects and are a bit small for a bird to mate with, aren't they? Kat - Female birds. Thank you, Chris. So perhaps the bird is actually seeing its reflection in the glass and flying at it, trying to attack it and not realising that it's not another bird, it's its own reflection. Especially with houses normally if the room behind it is quite dark, that makes the window look even more reflective and then act more like a mirror. So I suspect that your bird is fighting some imaginary turf war with itself and that's why it keeps flying into your window. Try keeping the lights on in the room so that the room's not so dark or try getting a cat or putting something like stickers or something on the window might help.

Chris - Or a shotgun of course.

Kat - Or a shotgun. No! That would be nasty.