This weekend...spot a swift

Swifts. They’re the screeching, scythe-shaped, signs of summer, with a sky-high lifecycle that almost defies belief. But they’re in trouble. There is now just one swift for every three that graced our skies back in 1995. That’s bad isn’t it?

To be honest, no one really knows why. We’re still researching the reasons, one theory is the loss of nest sites.

And this is where you come in. We need you to help us find out where swifts are currently nesting and where they used to nest.

Tell us about yours

We’re again running our annual swift survey. If you see a swift screeching overhead, or in an urban environment please let us know.

We also need to know if there are old nest sites that have been abandoned or lost too. Lots of traditional nest sites have been lost, as buildings are renovated, enlarged and even demolished.

We’ll be making the information available to local authorities, developers and planners. So your sightings will really be making a difference. The more we know about swifts, the more we can do to help.

Help swifts!

There’s a wealth of information about how you can help swifts on our website – it covers everything you need to know about the survey and, also, putting up nestboxes. If you want to do this then that’s great, but nestboxes are better when fitted during construction than afterwards.

So this weekend, look out for swifts. Please submit your sightings to our survey and help us find out more about this amazing, but declining bird before it’s too late.

Ps. Let me know how you get on. And take a look at Katie's blog post if you’re not sure if you can tell the difference between a swift, swallow, house martin or sand martin. It’s easy once you know how!