[Reporter's notebook] How "Bird Friends" save birds from noise barriers

I'd gone down to Yongin last weekend to participate in "A Picnic for Bird Friends," an event put on by people who are trying to prevent bird strikes

Volunteers put stickers onto noise barriers in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, on June 12. (Cheon Ho-sung/The Hankyoreh)

The stiff body of a great tit was found at the entrance to an apartment complex in the Yeokbuk neighborhood of the Cheoin District of Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, on June 12. The bird was just 10 cm (about 4 inches) in length, which meant it had died before reaching full size.

Four wild birds were found dead there that day: a great tit, a sparrow, a magpie, and even a rarely seen pygmy woodpecker. It turns out that the birds were killed by a 7m-high glass noise barrier that runs between the apartment complex and a nearby hill.

When birds experience a fatal collision with a transparent barrier that they fail to recognize, it’s called a “bird strike.”

Before we continue, allow me to introduce myself. I am Cheon Ho-sung, and I cover a range of incidents on the city desk. I’d gone down to Yongin last weekend to participate in “A Picnic for Bird Friends,” an event put on by people who are trying to prevent bird strikes.

When I first signed up, I saw the event as an ordinary weekend outing and wasn’t planning to do any reporting there.

But what I learned about bird strikes there was much worse than I’d expected, and I was moved by people’s dedication to saving the birds. That’s why I wrote a story about the 20,000 birds killed every day on glass surfaces and about the “bird friends” who use stickers to save their lives for the Hankyoreh’s June 14 edition.

In this article, I’d like to share the rest of the story with you.

Korea’s Ministry of Environment estimates that more than 600 birds are killed by crashing into noise barriers around the country every day. Combined with birds that have fatal collisions with glass walls, that adds up to 20,000 deaths a day.

A bird strike happens every four seconds – which means that a bird literally loses its life each time we blink.

A Picnic for Bird Friends is an event that Green Korea has held around the country since 2019. These “bird friends” attach fingernail-sized white stickers onto noise barriers where bird strikes have been frequently observed.

The event on June 12 was attended by around 30 people and was approved by the district office. A range of people attended the event, including mothers holding hands with their daughters, young couples who were on a date, and high school students who’d come up from Daejeon.

I also spotted a few thoroughly prepared bird friends wearing arm protectors and straw hats. They looked like veterans who’d already been to several of the events.

Green Korea wasn’t kidding when they described this as a popular event. Apparently, spaces fill up just a few days after an event is announced.

Volunteers are divided into three teams. The first team wipes down the glass with rags. The stickers don’t stay on as well when there’s dust on the glass.

The second team adds dots to the glass at set intervals with permanent markers attached to 1m-long poles.

The third team wraps up by placing stickers on every market dot.

The noise barriers are quite high, so the volunteers can only reach the first and second sections of the glass with ladders. The higher sections are left to the professionals, who bring bucket trucks.

The bird friends stick to a simple but strict principle, known as the “5x10 rule.” That is, there need to be stickers every 10cm horizontally and every 5cm vertically.

This rule is based on bird behavior: birds don’t pass through spaces smaller than that.

The stickers aren’t very noticeable to us humans since they’re only the size of a pinky fingernail. But they’re enough to help birds recognize that the glass is an obstacle, and not open space.

I was told that after volunteers put up stickers on a noise barrier in Seosan, South Chungcheong Province, in a previous event, the number of birds that ran into the barrier fell by 90%.

At this point, some skeptics are probably thinking it would be better to just build noise barriers with a lattice pattern than for volunteers to go to all that trouble in the muggy heat.

And they’re right. Green Korea said it cost 25,000 won (US$22.02) to buy enough stickers to cover two sheets of glass. That means that the extra work also places a considerable burden on society.

Even now, a number of local governments require bird of prey stickers to be placed on glass buildings, but these apparently aren’t very effective since birds don’t regard them as real threats.

So while the bird friends’ activities are important, it’s also important to design buildings that will prevent bird strikes. Simply requiring a lattice pattern on the windows of public buildings – which account for about one of every five buildings in Korea – would save a significant number of birds.

Over two hours, volunteers managed to cover an 80m-long noise barrier with stickers. The thought that so many people would gladly spend part of their weekend to save these little creatures gave me a warm tingly feeling on my ride back home.

The experience also helped me form a new habit. I’ve started listening to birdsong on the way to work.

As I thought about the birds leaving their nests and busily flying alongside the road I drive down, I made up my mind to find ways to help them in my normal routine.

I’m told that the bird friend events will continue in Seoul and other parts of Korea. You can sign up at greenkorea.org. Hope to see you there!

Cheon Ho-sung

By Cheon Ho-sung, staff reporter

Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]