Swift action helps avian visitors to Inverurie

SWIFT enthusiasts gathered at West Parish Church, in Inverurie on Wednesday for an informal drop-in hosted by NES Swifts (Huntly and District group) founder Cally Smith writes Griselda McGregor.

The event with slide shows and information on how to help these brave and now endangered wee birds was timed to coincide with Climate Week North East.

As well as climate change swifts, also house martins and swallows are threatend by loss of habitat.

To this end last year nesting boxes were fixed to West Church tower and swifts soon took up residence.

Eight bespoke nesting chambers now sit neatly behind the louvres of the tower.

They arrived after their 8000 mile migration from sub-Saharan Africa to breed.

They complete the entire journey without once touching the ground.

They spend more time airborne than any other species - eating, sleeping, drinking, mating on the wing.

During their short four month stay swifts are at their most audible when young are searching for homes of their own.

For this reason their collective noun is a scream of swifts.

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