When I was a child, “lights out” was not a suggestion—it was a decree
handed down nightly by my mother. No negotiations, no dramatic pleas for
“just five more minutes,” and certainly no hiding under the covers with a
flashlight and a book (though I may have tested that boundary once or
twice). The moment those words were spoken, the house went dark, the
day was officially over, and everyone was expected to cooperate. Funny
how decades later, I’m still hearing that same command in my head—only
now it’s not about bedtime, but about helping millions of migrating birds
safely navigate the night skies over Texas.
Back then, my mother’s reasoning was simple: people need sleep. These
days, “Lights Out” carries another kind of wisdom. Texas is the main flyover
state for migrating birds and each spring and fall, about 2 billion birds travel
across the state under the cover of darkness, using the moon, stars, and
natural light cues to guide them. Artificial lights can overpower those natural
signals. Our brightly lit homes, office buildings, parking lots, and city
skylines can confuse the nighttime travelers, pulling them off course and
sometimes leading to deadly collisions with windows and buildings. Some
will circle the lights until sheer exhaustion sets in, while others drop lower
into dangerous territory, attracted by the lights. At that level, reflections of
the sky, trees, and clouds in glass can appear to be safe, open habitat. In
an instant, what looked like a clear path becomes a deadly illusion—one
that far too many birds do not survive. Between 365 million and 1 billion
birds die each year due to collisions with buildings, the majority of which
are during migration.
Sometimes it takes a tragedy to force people to see a problem that has
been there all along, and that is exactly how Lights Out for Birds was born
in Texas. In 2017, Galveston workers arrived at the American National
Insurance building to find nearly 400 migratory birds dead around the
brightly lit tower. The sight was heartbreaking—a true wake-up call along
one of the most important migration corridors in North America. Out of that
disaster came action. Houston Audubon launched what would later become
the Lights Out Texas movement. In 2020 that effort expanded into the
broader statewide campaign. While the Lights Out idea began in a different
state, the tragic Galveston collision in 2017 sparked Texas’s own
movement and today it is supported by a coalition of Audubon Texas,
Houston Audubon, Cornell Lab’s BirdCast, Defenders of Wildlife, cities,
universities, and local partners across Texas.
Helping birds during spring and fall migration is remarkably simple.
Homeowners can switch off porch lights, landscape lighting, and
unnecessary indoor lights. Close blinds so window reflections don’t lure
birds closer. If you work in or visit an office building, consider encouraging
building owners or managers to join the Lights Out effort by dimming
decorative lighting and upper-floor office lights after hours. In a city like
Houston—where many downtown buildings already participate—every light
switched off becomes one less deadly trap for birds crossing our night
skies.
In Texas, the call for “lights out” begins March 1 and continues through
June 15 for spring migration, then returns August 15 through November 30
in the fall, when billions of birds pass overhead. Think of it as bird rush
hour—only instead of traffic jams on I-45, the skies above Texas are filled
with warblers, thrushes, buntings, and other feathered friends trying to
make their way safely south or north.
Texas’s largest skylines—from Houston and Dallas to Austin and San
Antonio—are proving that even big cities can make room in the night sky
for migrating birds. If entire city skylines can go dark for birds, surely the
rest of us can switch off a porch light.
PHOTO CAPTION: Dead birds from Galveston incident 2017
Photo by Josh Henderson/Galveston County Animal Control