Identificando tendências de colisões entre aves e vidraças em um campus universitário rural do Paraná

Abstract

Studies investigating annual avian mortality from collisions in glass structures show that billions of birds die each year. North America, a pioneer in this research, has a rate of about 1 billion birds wiped out annually by collisions. This work aims to understand the aspects that influence the occurrence of these accidents so that mitigation methods and public measures can be developed and adopted. Brazil is home to one of the greatest bird biodiversities on the planet; however, knowledge on the subject is still limited, since the efforts dedicated to this research are still few. Therefore, this project aimed to investigate the collisions and deaths of birds on glass structures in the Dois Vizinhos campus of the Universidade Tecnológica Federal do Paraná and potential factors that explain their trends. To this end, through an active search for collisions between birds and glass, data on the occurrence of accidents in 29 buildings of the institution between the years 2020 and 2021 were collected. The data obtained were analyzed by descriptive and inferential statistics to identify characteristics and trends that may influence these accidents, such as the area of the glass, the type of glass, and the environment surrounding the buildings. In all, 1010 collisions between birds and glass were registered in 21 of the 29 buildings surveyed, and 76 deaths were registered with 21 species from 12 different families, with Zenaida auriculata, Thraupis sayaca and Turdus amaurochalinus being the major victims. Pearson's correlation showed that the glass area correlated strongly, positively, with the death and collision rates. Also, it was found that the type of mirrored glass showed a tendency to influence the rates of collisions and deaths when compared to reflective and transparent glass, being a very relevant factor in some of the buildings. It is concluded that the glass area and the type of glass were the most determining factors for the accidents.