A swift victory for Scotland

Did you see the news that Scotland has just introduced a new law that means that in future, every new home must have a swift brick installed in them?

The move comes after campaigning to help these summer visitors to the UK who have declined by around 66% over the last 25 years according to The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB). This has led to them being put on the red list of birds of conservation concern.

Swifts normally like to nest in little holes under house roofs, and once they find a nest, they return to the same place every year.

However, there are now thought to be fewer than 40,000 pairs remaining due to the loss of natural nesting habitats. Swifts have lost access to millions of house roofs for nesting, thanks to renovations and modern insulation, so wildlife campaigners say the bricks are a small but essential measure for swifts and other birds.

Noisy neighbours 

This summer visitor can be seen right across the UK, but are most numerous in the south and east, with the visit coinciding with the breeding period, before it heads back to winter in Africa.

I’m lucky enough to have a troop of swifts descend on my neighbourhood in the middle of May and I love the way they speed up and down the street chasing their food. Their unmistakable, high-pitched ‘scream’ is the sound of summer for me and I’m always a bit sad when they depart in mid-August.

They really are amazing creatures as they migrate over 3,400 miles twice a year, stopping to refuel in places like Portugal and France along the way. In Gibraltar, another important fuelling point on the seasonal trip between Britain and sub-Saharan Africa, swift bricks have helped populations recover.

Prof John Cortes, the environment minister of Gibraltar, said: “Scotland’s decision on swift bricks is a significant step in ensuring the survival of this species, which has come to depend so much on us. On the ‘Rock’ we have had this policy for several decades and we have seen a declining population of swifts first stabilise and then increase.”

Aerial displays

Swifts are superb flyers and rarely touch the ground as they sleep, eat and even mate while flying. They are also amongst the fastest birds on the planet and can reach top speeds of around 70mph as they dart around the sky chasing insects and air ‘plankton’.

Once they’ve left the nest, they will keep flying for almost their entire life and only stop flying if they are breeding

Swifts eat, mate and sleep in the air – with one half of their brain being able to go to sleep, whilst the other keeps them functioning

Swifts pair for life and meet up again in May at the same nest site, which means my street is the site of quite a few marital reunions!

Weather forecaster

If you are lucky enough to have swifts near you, you might see excited parties of them screaming and careering madly at top speed around your neighbourhood’s rooftops and houses, especially towards dusk.

And if they’re not racing up and down the street at roof level, you might see them flying high in the sky, as they search for small invertebrates to eat and to feed to their chicks.

With a long, distinctive boomerang-shaped wing span and a short, forked tail, swifts are really quite distinct from swallows and house martins that they can initially be mistaken for.  

They mainly feed at around 50-100m, but sometimes weather conditions force them down to lower levels and I see this as a natural indicator of a change in the weather, so my visitors can also act as a weather wane as well as providing pure entertainment.

Thanks to the Scottish government’s policy, we should see numbers recover in Scotland and campaigning now focuses on Westminster and the Senedd to get them to follow Scotland’s lead.

Until then, it could well be worth investing in a swift box yourself, or even installing a swift brick or two.  One they find their new cosy home, you will have three months summer entertainment every single year.

Russell Jones is content and communications manager