Bird’s Eye View – Protecting our Birds
It is already September, and we’re in for peak migration of birds traveling to their wintering grounds.
Let’s work together to improve their chances of survival on their hazardous journey. We need bird-safe glass to prevent deaths from window collisions. We need dark skies to keep migrants safe.
The National Park has decided to keep the St Louis Gateway Arch dark overnight for the month of September. This is happening to protect the hundreds of thousands of birds traveling through St. Louis on their migration along the Mississippi River Flyway. Keeping the Arch dark is temporary. Overnight lights will again illuminate the Arch in October.
Our songbirds, warblers, vireos, and shorebirds migrate at night because the winds die down, temperatures cool, stars show the way, and evening flying is easier. But bright night lights in our cities pointed into the sky can confuse birds and mess with their navigation skills. Sometimes birds get tricked by the lights and keep circling until exhaustion overcomes them, and they crash to the ground.
Let’s follow St. Louis’ lead and ask all our municipalities along the Mississippi River Flyway to turn off unnecessary recreational and promotional lighting – just for September. Let’s give our birds the break they need.
And let’s not forget that we still need – more than ever – bird safe glass in our homes but especially in new commercial construction and on school and college campuses across the state.
Consider how our songbirds rest after a night of flight and wake to forage for food. They are in unfamiliar places and are tricked by reflections on glass windows and doors. They see trees and open spaces, then crash headfirst into the glass.
You may think they are just stunned. But you are the ones being tricked. Hitting your head at high speed into glass causes broken beaks, broken sternums, broken wings, and brain bleeds. If you can, collect the injured and bring them to the Wildlife Rehab Center to see if the bird can be saved.
If the bird is dead, photograph the bird at the scene, note its species, sex, adult or immature, GPS coordinates, location of the incident, street address, name of building, date, and time. If this incident occurs on a campus with a Stop the Thud Program, provide that information. If the incident occurs elsewhere, send the data to us at contact Saintpaulbirdalliance.org
Meanwhile, keep reminding public officials, developers, building owners, property managers that we need bird safe glass in all new construction and we need existing problem windows retrofitted with paracords or spotted decals on the exterior glass.
With birds in steep decline, we must do all we can to ensure our precious birds can take wing again on their journey.
Thanks for helping!
Jane Braun
Remembering a valued member of our community and the SPBA Board: Jane Braun
With deep affection and respect, we remember the contributions of Jane Ellen Braun to our Saint Paul Bird Alliance, to birding, and to caring for birds and people. Jane’s favorite bird was the green heron, with its brilliant iridescence.
Jane joined the Saint Paul Bird Alliance (formerly St. Paul Audubon Society) board of directors in 2018 and brought innovation and leadership.
She worked to establish criteria for the organization to award grants in Ramsey and Washington counties for projects to protect and improve bird habitat. She served as board vice president and helped provide steady, organized leadership to this all-volunteer organization for five years. Jane was an enthusiastic, welcoming, and educational force for birding. She led or collaborated on numerous field trips; she worked to ensure that birders of all levels felt valued in the local birding community.
Her life exemplified dedication and joy. Jane Ellen Braun, daughter of Richard and Ellen Braun, succumbed to pancreatic cancer on June 26, 2026, after a courageous dance with this insidious disease. Jane was born in Detroit Lakes and raised in Columbia Heights, graduating as valedictorian of her high school class. She is the beloved sister of Catherine and brother Bill, and a friend to so many. A proud jock, she could be found on most any basketball or volleyball court, softball diamond, ice rink or golf course.
A lifelong public servant, Jane worked in a variety of roles at the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH), Hennepin County Health Department, and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA). She was the State of Minnesota’s representative on the national Cancer Registry, which tracked cancer trends across the country, where she developed treasured friendships. Jane was also MDH’s Emergency Preparedness lead, working with other agencies and county public health officials to keep the public safe during epidemics, including H1N1 and Ebola, and during large events such as the 2008 Republican National Convention.
In 2015, Jane went to the MPCA to manage that agency’s emergency preparedness, remediation and closed landfill programs.
When she retired from MPCA in the spring of 2018, she used all her considerable intelligence and skills to become a passionate birder. She is currently listed in eBird as a top birder in many locations, both counties and countries. Jane voluntarily interrupted this passion in 2020 to return to MDH to assist with the State’s response to COVID, working with dedicated state and local public health officials to set up COVID testing and vaccination sites across the state and overseeing safety. Jane gave so much and made a difference for many people who never knew of her efforts. Such is the work of public health, of which she was so proud.
She traveled extensively, visiting 6 of the 7 continents. She had a deep love of the Minnesota State Fair, Xena Warrior Princess, extremely large fiberglass statues, and Bigfoot (who knew!). She could also identify where all the good bakeries were and would never pass up an opportunity to eat donuts, cake and ice cream.
Donations in Jane’s honor can be made to: Friends of Sax-Zim Bog (PO Box 3585, Duluth, MN 55803; Tucson Bird Alliance Vermilion Legacy Society (PO Box 91770, Tucson, AZ 85752 TIN #86-6053779); and the Global Penguin Society (Wildlife Conservation Network Supporting the Global Penguin Society, 209 Mississippi St., San Francisco CA 94107 EIN 30-0108469)
A celebration to honor her life, legacy and quirky nature will be held on Friday October 30 at 2 PM, with a reception to follow. Because of space constraints, we will send location information with your RSVP. If you are interested in attending, please email CelebrateJEB@gmail.com, so we can provide you with that information.
Chimney Swift Sit
On a balmy summer Saturday evening in June, a crowd gathered in the parking lot of a historic West Side neighborhood in St. Paul. People set up their lawn chairs and picnic blankets and munched on popcorn, waiting for the show. Not a movie, not a band, not Shakespeare in the Park. No, we were there to witness the show of Chimney Swifts descending from the sky into their night roost in the chimney of Casa de Luz, a church and rectory on George Street.
This Chimney Swift Sit event was sponsored by the MN DNR’s Non-game Program, the US Fish & Wildlife Service, Urban Bird Collective, Land of Lakes Bird Alliance, and Saint Paul Bird Alliance.
Monica Bryand from Urban Bird Collective and Mags Edwards of the DNR Non-game Program told us about the statewide Chimney Swift Recovery Project now underway. It is a community-based scientific project that everyone can join for free. The goal is to find Swift roosts, count Swifts, and track those numbers as they change week to week, including when they arrive in the spring and when they leave for South America, where they overwinter.
To learn more about the Swift Recovery Project and see how you can get involved, visit the MN DNR Chimney Swift Project.
It is important that we do all we can to help the Swifts. They are in steep decline. The loss of their roosting and nesting sites, along with the collapse of the insect population, puts Chimney Swifts in danger of extinction.
If you get a chance to go to a Chimney Swift Sit, do it! At our Sit on the West Side, I met so many neighbors. One family was very proud of their beautiful historic home and of hosting the Chimney Swifts. One neighbor had never heard of Swifts until that night. He was so grateful to learn. He told me about his parakeet and how much the bird means to him. Suddenly, my friend Arthur Brady showed up! He had been visiting his dad across the street and wondered what all the hullabaloo was about. Arthur started thinking that his dad’s house has a chimney of Swifts, too. “I always thought they were bats!” Arthur said.
That’s the thing about Chimney Swifts, and birds in general, they help us humans connect with each other on common ground. Birds show us we are all related.
Kiki Sonnen – SPBA President
Photo Ben Cvengros
