Across Texas in the early morning hours before the sun is up, volunteer crews walk routes in downtown metropolitan areas looking for dead or stunned birds from building collisions. These crews are a part of the Lights Out, Texas! campaign, a statewide initiative that aims to bring awareness and inspire action to protect the billions of migratory birds that fly over Texas by turning lights out.  

Collision monitoring crews are helpful in documenting where most bird fatalities are happening in our urban areas and give us useful data when talking with building owners. An estimated one billion U.S. bird deaths occur annually from collisions with buildings and structures, with migratory species most at risk. It is also estimated that one in four birds migrating through the U.S. passes through Texas, making our geographical location extremely important for this conservation initiative. Since the BRTC engaged in the Lights Out Texas collaborative in 2020, more than 2,000 observations of dead birds have been made on iNaturalist.   

But what happens to all those birds after they have been documented?  Check out our Q&A with Heather to learn more about what happens after the birds are collected and sent to the BRTC. 

Q: How did BRTC get involved with Lights Out Texas?  

The BRTC maintains an active research Collection of Birds (and other vertebrates) with the mission of documenting biodiversity of space and time. In late 2020, we were connected with Tim Brys from the Perot Museum and Ben Jones, then with Texas Conservation Alliance. These two Dallas-area partners cultivated a community engagement that amassed a freezer full of roughly 400 dead birds in Fall 2020. Tim and Ben were scratching their heads trying to figure out what to do with these birds because it seemed like a resource that could and should be used by others. Because these birds were individually documented and had the right data associated with them, we offered to be the final repository for the specimens so they would be made available to other researchers – which is part of our primary mission at the BRTC. These opportunistic specimens can provide researchers with materials they would otherwise have limited or no access to (eg. sensitive species, endangered species). Our involvement grew as the program spread across the state. 

Q: How do volunteer crews send BRTC specimens?  

Because all migratory birds are protected by both state and federal law, Lights Out volunteer crews that survey for casualties deposit specimens into freezers after each survey, stationed at either a local museum, wildlife rehabilitation center, or university that are under the control of a state and federally permitted person. When the survey season ends, the specimens are transferred in-bulk to the BRTC. This is a critical part of the process and must be followed.  

Q: What are the steps involved in preparing a specimen?  

There are quite a few steps involved in preparing a specimen! Before we prepare the specimen to our museum standards, we verify the identification of the bird, record the data (date and locality, and casualty ID as entered in the iNaturalist project), prepare tubes for collecting tissue, brain, ectoparasites, endoparasites, a GI tract packet, and an anatomical tag. The tag includes the preparation number and links the specimen back to its data. Mass 

and standard morphological measurements are taken and the specimen is swabbed for highly pathogenic avian influenza. Only then is the specimen ready to be skinned and stuffed. The process that we use has been employed by natural history collections for hundreds of years. What is created is a “study skin” and not a lifelike taxidermy mount, because to efficiently store the specimens, they need to be able to fit neatly into our cabinet drawers. It’s also not necessary to create a lifelike finished product because the scientists that use collections like ours are able to see and measure everything they might be interested in from a study skin. 

To create the study skin, the specimen is essentially turned inside out with a series of intricate steps each of which affects the final quality of the specimen. The specimen is then reinverted, cotton eyeballs installed, supporting stick placed along where the (no longer present) backbone was, filled with nonabsorbent cotton, and sewn closed. The specimens are positioned and pinned to foam board to dry, sent through freezer fumigation and then through chemical fumigation before being tagged and installed into our collections cabinets. 

Q: How many hours does it take to prepare a specimen?  

Good question - it really depends on the person preparing the specimen. I always compare the preparation process to arts and crafts, because it really is an artform and the process involves things like scissors, thread, sewing, and positioning. First-timers might take up to 4 hours to prepare a Cowbird-sized bird. Seasoned volunteer preparators should take about an hour per songbird. Other preparators, myself included, can zip through a songbird in under 30 minutes.  

Q: What key pieces of information have come from analyzing the birds?  

In reality, this dataset is in its infancy. We will need many more years of data to really predict trends in birds that migrate through Texas and those that are most impacted by light pollution. However, there are a few observations that have been made that we are keeping our eyes on. For example, the timing and route of migration for certain species is becoming more obvious – the American Woodcock has only been documented moving through Texas during fall migration, and the timing of this migration is later than the vast majority of songbirds that we see. These are potential trends that can add to our knowledge of the species and help to inform conservation efforts. Our Lights Out partners across the state are also starting to learn from the dataset which buildings, and even which side of the buildings, are problematic for birds. This knowledge can help to inform policy makers where to support and promote bird friendly building design.  

Q: What types of research have been helped by preparing the birds?  

We have a robust and ever-growing group of collaborators from within and outside the University that are interested in using Lights Out birds for their research projects. For example, a graduate student from University of Texas-San Antonio was interested in studying microplastic content by feeding strategy. We received a wish list of GI tracts to study and were able to fill the entire list with Lights Out specimens in a few months, jump-starting her research. The list of collaborators keeps growing, and currently includes faculty, undergraduates and graduate students from our own department, the Schubot Center for Avian Health – also at Texas A&M University, University of Texas-San Antonio, and others.  

Our collaborators are learning more about the prevalence of certain diseases and pathogens in migratory birds including avian malaria, highly pathogenic avian influenza, and avian bornavirus. 

   We also have teams investigating how microplastics might be affecting migratory birds and looking at general physiology conditioning of migratory birds. At this early point, we are simply amassing datasets that can grow as the project continues and while it will take years to build, we are able to learn more with each season. The biggest challenge with providing samples to our collaborators is simply having enough hands on-deck to prepare the birds, enter their data, and curate them into the collections. 

Q: Are you displaying the birds for any educational outreach this year?  

YES! I am very fortunate to be surrounded by creative minds and the ability to collaborate with galleries on our main campus in the Memorial Student Center (MSC). I currently have a team of students, some of whom are enrolled in an Advanced Museum Studies course, working on designing an educational and artistic exhibit that will be installed in the James R. Reynolds gallery in late summer. The gallery is overseen by students from the MSC Visual Arts Committee who always have interesting and innovative ideas for how to interpret the science that happens at the BRTC.  

We will be including some original digital portraits of birds that are highly impacted by light pollution. These portraits were designed by one of the graduate students that works alongside me at the BRTC. They are stunning! We will also include original oil on canvas artwork from a local artist that has used our specimens to inform her work and original bird-inspired monoprints that were created at a local art studio by students that help to prepare Lights Out specimens at the BRTC. And of course, we will include study skins of specimens too! It is free admission, and we anticipate tens of thousands of students, faculty, staff, and alumni visitors. Check back on the Audubon Texas website for more information this summer.

Q: What is one take away from your work you would like everyone to know?

As a traditional biodiversity collection, the BRTC never charges researchers for the use of our specimens. Under normal circumstances, we would acquire specimens directly from a researcher that collected specimens as part of their funded research. These specimens would have been prepared to our standards to the collections allowing for fairly easy entry into the collections. The Lights Out birds are a different case because they do not belong to any particular researcher and they arrive unprepared – so it has fallen on the shoulders of the BRTC to prepare the specimens and disperse samples to our research network. With hundreds of birds each migration season being shuttled to the BRTC, we are actively seeking funds to support what we do and how we support both the training of the next generation of museum professionals and biodiversity scientists, as well as the community of researchers benefiting from our research and curating efforts. You can visit us online to support BRTC and the work we do.