SOUTH DEERFIELD — With nearly 3 billion of the country’s breeding adult birds lost since the 1970s, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has launched Bring Birds Back, a campaign raising awareness about the loss of birds with a grassroots component focusing on bird collisions with glass and other structures.

As part of Deerfield Elementary School’s annual Community Service Day on Tuesday, that campaign has now come to Franklin County, with some of the school’s fifth graders joining Pam Toschik, an assistant regional director for migratory birds with U.S. Fish and Wildlife’s Region 5, to retrofit one of the school’s windows with decals to help prevent collisions. These are the leading threat for birds in the country, as 1 billion die each year in collisions with glass and structures, according to the agency.

“Window collisions are preventable. It’s all about making windows visible,” Toschik said as she worked with three students to place bird-shaped decals on the window. “Simple actions can make a major conservation effect. … If you think about all buildings, offices and homes, it adds up.”

Because of its transparency, glass is invisible to birds and reflects trees, bushes and blue skies, which can trick birds into flying right into it. There are several methods for making windows visible to birds, including decals, paint, or screens and netting. For decals, Toschik said, they must be placed no more than 2 inches apart, because birds will try to fly into tight spaces, thinking it is a place they can squeeze by.

For more tips from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, visit its website at tinyurl.com/BirdCollisionTips.

Zoey Mason, Gertrude Shulda and Toschik’s daughter Simone were among the students who placed the decals on a school window on Tuesday, where they learned about the high number of bird collisions and shared their own stories. The students and Pam Toschik said the window they were working on had seen collisions in the past.

“Before this, I didn’t know how many birds were getting hurt,” Zoey said. “I think it’s cool we have the ability to save the birds.”

Simone added she was surprised to learn that birds of all types, such as hummingbirds, collide with windows.

“You expect some of the larger birds,” she said, noting her surprise about hummingbirds. “With the hummingbird feeders near the house, you’re kind of asking for them to crash.”

Community Service Day is an annual event at the school where each grade takes part in community service activities to get the students out into the community and learn about giving back.

Along with retrofitting the window, students worked to create flyers, bookmarks and bags for Tilton Library’s summer reading program; put together snack bags for local community meal programs; create welcome signs in numerous languages for the Center for New Americans; and clean up the school’s courtyards. First grade students also took a walking field trip to the Deerfield Police Station and South Deerfield Fire District to deliver snacks to first responders.

“It’s a day where we try to find age-appropriate activities … to give back to the greater community or school community,” sixth grade teacher and event organizer Carla Chilton said. “We’re trying to remind students they are part of a larger or greater community. If we all do little bits, it makes a big impact.”

Chris Larabee can be reached at clarabee@recorder.com.