A Lights Out Baltimore volunteer holds a common yellowthroat that survived a window collision near Baltimore’s Inner Harbor. Photo by Alisha Camacho / Capital News Service.
By Alisha Camacho
A little after 4:30 a.m. in downtown Baltimore, Nicole Hartig and Jon Merryman spotted their first victim.
“We have one bird here,” said Merryman, a veteran volunteer.
He snapped photos of the white-throated sparrow while Hartig, 37, placed the bird in its tomb, a crinkling plastic sandwich bag.
Merryman, 62, spoke into his phone: “20 S. Charles Street, Northeast corner of the lobby,” transcribing his notes into iNaturalist, an online tracking tool cataloging the group’s work since 2008.
Not a poetic obituary. But their 5-mile expedition just began at the peak of fall migration.
It’s time to go.
Dimming light on a deadly problem
An estimated 4 billion birds soar over the United States each fall. Hartig and Merryman are part of an initiative advocating for bird-safe building practices to protect these migratory marvels from fatal window collisions.
Lights Out began in the 1990s in Toronto when volunteers noticed birds drawn to artificial lights. Volunteers asked building managers to turn off night lights, a call that reached the Baltimore Bird Club by 2008.
Their call to action caught the eye of Lindsay Jacks, a recent transplant to Maryland. By 2012, Jacks became the executive director of Lights Out Baltimore, volunteering up to 20 hours a week during migration seasons, coordinating rescues, collecting data and working with building managers.
Baltimore’s proximity to the Chesapeake Bay makes it a perfect stopover for migratory birds, Jacks said. The group’s consistent route includes high-risk buildings near the harbor.
“Dead birds are science,” Jacks said. “If we can’t collect it, we don’t have the data to make change.”
Volunteers have encountered nearly 3,000 dead and injured birds since 2018, according to a Capital News Service analysis of the group’s data on iNaturalist.
‘Alcove of death’
Buckets and nets in hand, Hartig and Merryman scanned their surroundings.
“Hold on, I think I see a bat,” Merryman said.
“Nope, it’s just a leaf,” he shrugged, crunching it with his boot.
“An easy mistake.”
The group has collected over 127 bats since 2008, including an eastern red bat Hartig recently rescued near the District Courthouse.
Their next stop: the “alcove of death,” a nickname for the Baltimore Convention Center.
According to a CNS analysis, the Convention Center has seen the most bird strikes along their route since 2018, surpassing its predecessor, the National Aquarium.
The National Aquarium was retrofitted with a bird-friendly film in 2018, Jacks said. Bird-friendly glass was added to its rainforest exhibit in 2022.
Zero window strikes have been documented at the aquarium by Lights Out Baltimore volunteers since 2018, the analysis showed.
For humans, the Baltimore Convention Center is a structural glass marvel, with floor-to-ceiling windows displaying natural light and sustainable landscapes. Birds think so, too — except they can’t see the glass. And so, as they fly toward this sanctuary, bam. Their lights go out.
In response to concerns, the center’s leadership team recently met with Jacks.
“Due to our sustainability focus, the (Baltimore Convention Center) has already followed many recommendations, such as turning off lights for spaces that are not in use,” said deputy director Phil Costa in a written response to questions. The Convention Center plans to incorporate bird-friendly elements into future renovations as funds allow.
“I’m not sure if you can ask for more than that,” Merryman said.
Guided by starlight, rerouted to death
Dawn broke over the Inner Harbor as Hartig and Merryman approached the Hyatt Regency hotel. A yellow scarlet tanager lay between the hotel and its multistory parking lot, brimmed with foliage.
Males, known for their bright red plumage, molt to a yellow-green before migrating to the tropical Andean foothills.
Like other migratory birds, tanagers rely on the moon and stars to navigate. This one likely mistook artificial lights for starlight while soaring over Baltimore City. Disoriented, he may have interpreted plant reflections in the windows as its destination – or been drawn to the hotel’s interior lights, like a month to a flame. Either way, this bird’s migration was cut short.
About 75% of the birds they encounter are going to be dead, said Merryman, “but you got to get past those to get to the one that’s still alive.”
Merryman crouched down, scooping the body into the bucket-turned-morgue.
The deceased birds will be stored in a volunteer’s freezer until transported to the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History, joining one of the world’s largest collections of bird specimens.
Rescued birds are secured in brown-paper lunch bags and driven to the Phoenix Wildlife Center. Trained volunteers tend to their medical needs until they can be released.
Progress comes with a learning curve
Morning rays shimmered off the Inner Harbor and the tall glass facade of the Maryland Science Center.
Hartig and Merryman scurried past a native garden. Less than 30 feet away, the skeletal outlines of dinosaurs stood behind glass walls.
Distance matters, Merryman said. Placing trees (or bird feeders) less than 3 feet or more than 30 feet reduces collisions.
While native gardens are becoming popular, there is a learning curve. Bird-friendly infrastructure is not “a centralized conversation at this point,” Hartig said. It’s “still sort of on the fringes.” So, while a valuable food source and habitat, the garden may double as a death trap when placed too close to windows.
The Science Center ranked second for bird strikes documented since 2018, according to the group’s data.
Interior and exterior lights are left on to “create a safe and secure environment for our guests and neighbors,” center spokesperson Christopher Cropper said in an email. In response to concerns raised by Lights Out Baltimore, the center “pledged to address the issues” and aims to retrofit the glass facade with bird-friendly sticker treatments by June 2026, as part of its $10 million campus greening project.
“We have no formal agreement with the organization,” Cropper said, but “it is fair to say that Lights Out Baltimore was the first to alert us to the scale of the issue, which is why we are actively working toward a solution.”
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology surveyed barriers to participating in the Lights Out program. “In cities, there is certainly a concern about safety in darkened areas,” said Tina Phillips, a social scientist at the lab. “However, targeted, downward lighting has been shown to be more effective and safe.” Some city districts also resist darkening their skylines, she said.
Jacks stresses, “It’s not about turning every single light out so that we’re in pitch black … it just means we need to be better and more efficient with how we use lighting.”
Former Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh’s administration worked with Lights Out Baltimore to update the city’s lighting. As old sugar cube lights burn out, they’re replaced with warm, downward-shielded fixtures, Jacks said.
The jury is out on the right color tones for bird safety.
“The best but highly imperfect science holds that white and blue light generally creates more problems for birds,” said Andrew Farnsworth, visiting scientist at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. “Intensity is a serious issue and an almost completely understudied variable.”
While further research is underway, Farnsworth said turning off nonessential lights is ideal. The lab also supports tools like BirdCast, sending localized migration alerts to your phone.
It’s a tough sell
A song sparrow lay beside the World Trade Center. Officer Morgan Kaimon, intrigued by the investigation, stepped out.
“It’s like that every day,” Kaimon said, pointing to different windows on site. “This side, that side — they’re just constantly running into the windows.”
“The biggest problem is that they will get a concussion,” Hartig explained. “What we’re doing is taking him to a rehabilitator who can give him an anti-inflammatory so that the swelling goes down. And usually, they are released in about a day or two.”
“It’s great what you’re doing,” Kaimon said. “God bless.”
Employees are usually curious about their work. Others are terrified. On a different walk, while rescuing a bird, Hartig encountered a woman screaming. The woman said, “Birds in the city are basically like rats.”
Motivating people to take action on window strikes – regardless of whether they enjoy birds – can be difficult, Jacks said.
“I think my biggest challenge is getting people to look at birds as something more important than something to look at,” said Jacks, who wants people to recognize how essential birds are.
“You know, if we had a ton of puppies that ran into glass, people would be more motivated to do something, but it’s a disconnect from a bird,” Jacks said.
Still, Jacks believes the program has gained traction. Of the 27 buildings they monitor, 22 participate in it, she said. But relationships can be fickle.
“It is frustrating,” Merryman said. Setbacks occur as new businesses and staff come along. “All of a sudden, lights are on again, right? And we’re starting all over.”
Merryman shares updates and photos from walks on Facebook.
“You want people to realize it’s an issue, but you don’t want to, you know, bombard them so much that they just look away,” he said.
Some people don’t want to make those connections “because maybe it’s sad for them,” he said.
Jacks takes a practical, compartmentalized approach to the work.
“If I were to get emotional every day, I would not be able to do it,” she said. “But I know that if I don’t have that dead bird or that dead Baltimore oriole, I may not encourage a building to turn their lights out or make a building bird safe.”
Doing what they can, one day and bird at a time
It’s past 9 a.m., and the volunteers risk getting a ticket or towed. Meanwhile, the buckets are visibly vibrating – a breakout is emerging.
Hartig and Merryman speed-walk to the final hand-off location, where another volunteer waits to transport the survivors to the Phoenix Wildlife Center.
It can be difficult to move on when you know more birds could be saved. “But you’ve got to walk away at some point,” Merryman said. Then you “show up the next day and do your part again.”
Ten rescued birds are relocated to the backseat of the car while the remaining 13 dead birds are packed away.
The occasional rescues are a big help, Hartig said. Some days are harder than others, but this morning, all rescued birds survived and were released by the Phoenix Wildlife Center.
– Capital News Service is a student-staffed reporting service operated by the University of Maryland’s Phillip Merrill College of Journalism. Stories are available at the CNS site and may be reprinted as long as credit is given to Capital News Service and, most importantly, to the students who produced the work.