On
the first Wednesday in January the members were treated to a highly informative
and entertaining talk by Dick Newell championing the Common Swift and the organisation
Action for Swifts which is doing a
huge amount of work to research and reverse the Swift’s decline over the past
20 or so years.
Dick’s
talk fell into 3 parts. The first
outlined their history and distribution – they are not related to the very
similar Swallows and House Martins, but share a common ancestor with and are
related more closely to the Hummingbirds of the world. Over the years, first ringing, and now work
with geo-locators and new high-tech gizmos has, and continues to, enlighten
researchers into their movements while on migration around across and up and
down the globe and also provide information as to their breeding habits and
longevity
The
second part of the talk focused on their steep decline – 50% over 20 years –
more than even House Sparrow and Starling.
Remarkably, the House Sparrow and Starling are still Red Listed even
though their decline is thought to have stabilized. Whereas, Swifts are only Amber Listed despite
their decline still plummeting at the rate of 5% per annum. Loss of nest sites, declines in the insect
supply, losses on migration to Southern Africa could all be partly or wholly
responsible for this decline. What isn’t
in question is the figure of less than 100,000 breeding pairs reported in the
UK.
And
so, the third part of this fact-filled talk, focused on the many and varied
methods Dick’s team have researched and experimented with to provided just one
(or more) extra viable nest site alongside each current successful breeding
pair, which it is hoped will fairly quickly double the number of breeding pairs
across the country. Dick left us all
with literature and the link to the Action
for Swift blogsite and inspired to see what we could all do in our homes,
schools and churches to facilitate these iconic birds of the summer skies.
Helen Franklin.
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