Dallas turned off lights to save birds migrating through Texas. Will Fort Worth join?
Ben Jones is familiar with the numbers: More than a billion birds travel through Texas during the fall migration period in September and October, and millions of them die by crashing into buildings, particularly skyscrapers in Houston, Dallas and Fort Worth.
But the statistics hit home in a new way when the woodcocks, warblers and other migratory species were collected in front of him. Across 50 mornings in Dallas this fall, Jones, the executive director of the Texas Conservation Alliance, gathered with groups of volunteers to count 457 birds that had been killed after building collisions — a relatively low count compared to massive collision incidents in the past.
“When you’re standing there, and white-throated sparrows are literally dropping out of the sky from collision right there where you’re surveying and kind of falling down around you, that’s a whole other understanding,” Jones said.
In an effort to reduce the number of bird deaths across the state, Jones worked with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology to promote Lights Out Texas, a campaign urging Texans and building owners to turn off non-essential outdoor and indoor lights between 11 p.m. to 6 a.m., when birds are coasting on a superhighway toward the south.
Light pollution can create a “deathtrap” for migratory birds, which are drawn out of their typical elevation and into a chaotic downtown environment, Jones said. Each year, between 365 million and 988 million birds across the U.S. are killed when they collide with buildings, according to studies cited by the Cornell Lab.
Despite some obstacles posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, organizers earned public support from former First Lady Laura Bush, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson, the Dallas Zoo and the Perot Museum. In Dallas, 13 buildings — including Dallas City Hall and Reunion Tower — turned off their decorative lighting for a week or more during the peak migration period, which lasted from Sept. 5 to Oct. 29.
“I do think Laura Bush was a driving influence, and her word meant something in the Dallas area,” said Julia Wang, who led the Lights Out Texas project for the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. “That momentum from an influencer really helped us this fall, and it’s something we’re trying to replicate in other cities. We’re hoping to see this grow in Fort Worth, and Houston, and frankly all across the state as well. I would love to see other mayors issue proclamations of Lights Out nights for the spring period.”
Fort Worth’s participation was quiet this year, the first that Lights Out Texas focused on spreading awareness in North Texas. With the 2021 spring migration period projected to last from April 19 through May 7, Jones would like to see the campaign grow organically among local conservation groups.
“It needs to be place-based, and nobody knows Fort Worth like they do: the buildings, the structures, the people who own the buildings,” Jones said. “There’s a strength to it when it’s that way.”
The effort could face opposition from developers who want to showcase their lights downtown, according to Charley Amos, a former president of the Fort Worth Audubon Society and a graduate of the Texas Master Naturalist program, which trains volunteers to educate communities about natural resources.
The dramatic impact of light pollution on migrating birds is also still largely unknown outside of birding or environmental communities, but framing the argument as an economic win is helpful when talking to policymakers, Amos said. In her outreach to building owners and city leaders, Wang said she highlights how participating in Lights Out Texas can lead to a reduction in energy costs by turning off non-essential lights.
“All we can do is, in our different clubs and associations, just try to spread the word as much as possible,” Amos said. “Leaders do listen, you just got to get your story out there and put it in economic terms. Yes, we want to do this to save the birds and that sounds good, but you get in their pocketbooks and you get their attention.”
Diane Covey, a spokesperson for the city’s code compliance department, said that everyone working on Fort Worth’s environmental management team agrees that Lights Out Texas is a “very worthy” project.
“However, a project of this size would need to be presented and reviewed by our Mayor and Council,” Covey said by email. “All our energies and bandwidth are being focused on the most critical issue at this time, which is COVID-19. It’s something environmental would consider in the future.”
Even during the COVID-19 crisis, Fort Worth leaders have shown a willingness to embrace environmental causes, said Jim Marshall, the leader of Project Bluebird, a Fort-Worth based group that builds and maintains nest boxes to grow the region’s largely non-migratory eastern bluebird population. Marshall pointed to the city’s summer acquisition of Broadcast Hill through its Open Space Conservation Program as an example.
Each year since 2015, Mayor Betsy Price has also signed the National Wildlife Federation’s Mayors’ Monarch Pledge, which aims to create habitats for the monarch butterfly and pollinators, Marshall said.
“That’s an indication that maybe there would be policymakers who would be receptive to an initiative like this,” Marshall said. “It’s not like the mayor is turning a deaf ear to environmental concerns, but she has to be careful because she’s got to balance all of the interests of these different constituents. But if it were a proclamation where we say, ‘we can control some city buildings, and we can encourage people to do these things without forcing,’ that could work.”
Marshall hopes that the Lights Out Texas campaign can align itself with groups like the International Dark Sky Association, which focuses on reducing artificial light pollution by introducing alternative light fixtures that provide better visibility of the night sky. Doing so would make light pollution a year-round issue, Marshall said, and help show residents why they should care about its impact on the environment.
“If people know that there are alternatives where you can have both, and balance between the needs of having residential and commercial lighting and decreasing the light pollution causing problems with migrating birds, you can look for small steps in and around Fort Worth that can be made,” Marshall said.
