On a sunny day the reflection as seen in a window can look a lot like clear blue flyable-intoable sky. Until they discover it isn’t. I had a house with a wall of windows that regularly murdered birds. Poor things!
I’ve posted this before.
We were once driving along a country road. Ahead of us was an open convertible being driven by a young woman. Suddenly from the side of the road in front of her as she drove along a hawk flew up, a dead ground squirrel in its claws. The hawk and the car were a near miss, and the hawk in its fright let go of the ground squirrel and dropped it neatly into the woman’s open car. We couldn’t tell if it fell behind her or if she noticed it, so we followed her to see if we couldn’t alert her to it. After awhile, she pulled off into the parking lot of a roadhouse which had a crowd of drunks outside. The drunks all wanted to chat up the young woman, but we pulled in, too, and pointed out the dead squirrel in her car, and it was duly disposed of.
That was weird.
Back in the 80s I moved into a new apartment. It was on the 2nd floor of an old four-plex. That night around 11:00 I went in the bathroom to take a shower. For some reason I closed the door (I lived alone). When I was done, I tried to open the door and the knob just spun around. There was nothing in the bathroom I could use to try to jimmy the door. I tried throwing myself against it but that didn’t work. I yelled for help but it was a tiled bathroom. No one could hear me. And, of course, jumping up and down on the floor hoping someone below would hear didn’t work either. I was getting a little panicked by this point.
So I tried to open the window. It was painted shut so it took me a while to finally get it open wide enough to yell through. Below the window was a driveway and there was another apartment building on the other side. I yelled “help” for some time. Finally, a woman on the first floor of the other building opened her window. I told her what had happened and asked her to call the fire department.
It was nearing midnight by this time. The fire truck showed up sirens blaring and woke the neighborhood. They put up a ladder and a big fireman came up, got the window opened all the way, came in the bathroom and kicked the door open. Mind you, I had been taking a shower and only had a towel around me. He was laughing and I was laughing. I apologized for his trouble and showed him to the front door. I looked out the window and saw a bunch of people out front. It was a weird completely unexpected way to introduce myself to the neighborhood.
I too believe it could have been a bird hitting your window. I was in my home a few years back and heard a loud bang from the bathroom. The room was dark, and I checked around, and tried the window. Saw a bird on the ground fluttering below the window and deduced it had hit the window. Closing it and looking closely, I could see the tiniest spot of smudge with fluffy gray feathers stuck to it, the only trace on the window of what had happened.
I once was driving along the country highway about a mile from my current home. There you can drive full highway speed (60 to 70 mph) and being in Indiana, you may see a cardinal or two. Unfortunately I did see two one day. It looks like one was being chased by another, both seen by me very briefly–in a flash as in a photo-- as we all streaked along at full speed. The one in front cleared my vehicle’s hood, but the one in chase didn’t. It hit the corner of the fender/hood with a loud thump and bounced. I hate to think this pretty red bird was hurt by my truck but it’s likely.
My final bird story. So, how do we keep birds from windows? By applying a dark silhouette sticker or vinyl of a bird of prey. Birdy sees that and does a midair 180, saving their noggins. And how do we keep birds from roosting in a large loftlike structure? With a dummy bird of prey. I was walking with family after having parked my car along the Swinomish channel in La Conner, WA. There was the large barnlike building right on the channel that was presumably used for boat repair or similar. Two women were peeking in the doors, pointing and whispering. They were convinced there were a couple of owls in there, high up. The lady preceding us down the sidewalk was loudly laughing, so we asked her what’s up. She said those were plastic owls, used to keep other birds away, not a special birdwatching experience.
Were there any fruit crops in the area, or any other crop ripening that’s attractive to birds?
If so, my bet is a zon gun. The ones used in the grapes around here still sometimes make me jump, even though I’m expecting them.
I like that the funeral home’s next door!
– that’s the thing I meant, indeed. Except they’re a lot louder than the video made that one sound; though I expect the news broadcasters didn’t want to drive everybody out of their houses, so they probably turned it down relative to the rest of the sound. It might also be a small one – they’re just trying to cover one spot, not acres of vineyard.
I thought of that at the time, but it was too early in the season. Plus I looked aroung and listened and there were no more bangs…
That is an interesting suggestion. We have a lot of birds in my area because of all the agricultural lands, parks, wetlands and reserves. Plus we have a great diversity of habitat. A bird hitting a window can be pretty loud. Its not inconceivable that the bird could have flown away afterwards, or maybe it could have fallen into the ditch and I didn’t see it.
Most plausible suggestion I have heard so far…
The timers can be set for varying periods; so unless you hung around for quite a while you might not have heard any more, even if that was what it was.
The season may be more of an issue.
While on the topic of birds hitting windows…One afternoon I was in our kitchen with my back to the glass sliding doors (to the deck) and there was a big bang. I turned to see that a starling had flown full speed into the glass and had dropped to the deck, clearly dead. Before I could react a red-tailed hawk swooped down, grabbed the starling and flew off with it. I presume that the starling was flying at full speed because it was being chased by the hawk! It was all over in a flash, leaving a smudge on the glass and a couple of feathers on the deck. If I hadn’t been in the room at that moment I would never have known it happened.
A few years ago, I was in a new house. I woke up to a loud BANG. But just one. I was unsure if it was a sound in a dream, or for real. This happened a few more times. One loud BANG in the middle of the night.
Then one day I was in the kitchen, I happened to see the neighbor teen jumping the fence, walking to my house hitting it just one time BANG then running off. Little fucker.
Our family had a Ford Pinto when I was growing up.
One morning, when it had been parked in the garage overnight, my brother went out to use the car - and the rear window was shattered. The entire thing was one big sheet of gravel - mostly held together but the occasional piece fell off and onto the back seat.
We think it was something weird with a sudden temperature change.
A Pinto, eh? Maybe a fly landed on the rear bumper.
I call it “Phantom Cat Syndrome”. Lying in bed at night. Usually on my side but occasionally lying on my back. With a sheet or sheet/bedspread over my lower body. I feel sequential downward pressures on the bedding moving on one side of my legs and around my feet and back up the other side of my legs. This can go on for a minute. Haven’t had a cat for almost 2 years.
My wife had that happen last summer.
I, on the other hand, had three or four nights (also last summer) when I was lying in bed and felt a cat jump onto it. There were definitely no cats in the room.
This is why it’s necessary to have cats in the room. Prevents things like this from happening. (Or, at any rate, from being detectable, if they do.)
I have inside/outside cats, which results in inside/outside possums. So if I don’t look, I have Schrodinger’s thing walking across me at night.
OK, still on the topics of unexpected bangs…
A couple of nights ago I heard a sharp BANG and a very slight tremor, as if something heavy had fallen over inside the house, such as the basement, as if one of our cats had knocked something over. My son, upstairs, heard the same thing and wondered the same. (We live in a cluster of houses in predominantly rural land, with large plots and lots of farming fields nearby. Sort of a mix of suburban and rural.)
My wife, however, had been hearing smaller bangs…like our neighbors fooling around with guns, as they sometimes do, shooting stuff at their little impromptu firing range. After the series of “gun” type bangs, there was this louder BOOM, then silence after that, and she’s quite sure all these noises were from a nearby neighbor, not inside our own house. Maybe they were shooting something that exploded?! And being satisfied with the result, they stopped for the evening…?
I was eating sunflower seeds in the wind yesterday. I spit out some shells, they arced upward and to the right. Just then, Hickory Dog comes running toward me and stops suddenly. The shells drop and land directly on her nose.
That was weird.