Swifts Need Our Help!
- Sarah Davis
- 10 hours ago
- 3 min read
As part of Swift Awareness Week 2026, I am writing to introduce you to these wonderful birds.
Swifts spend their life on the wing, eating, drinking, mating and even sleeping all whilst in flight. Once they fledge, they never land for the first 3 years of their life. They are aerial insectivores that can eat up to 1000 insects in a single day, 5000 if they are also feeding chicks. Their role in controlling insect populations makes them vital to our ecosystem.
Swifts arrive in this country at the end of April and they are only with us for 12 short weeks, leaving by the middle of August at the latest. Hearing their territorial screeches as they fly over our rooftops signifies the oncoming of summer.
They have perfect aerodynamics with scythe-shaped wings which allow them to soar vast distances with little effort and at 70mph they fly faster than any other species of bird in horizontal flight.
Unable to perch on branches like other birds, swifts used to rely on holes in ancient trees and cliffsides to nest, more recently having to adapt to urban environments by taking up residence in roof eaves and cavities. But even these spaces are disappearing with newer builds and renovations.
As one female common Swift falls asleep under the star lit skies of Africa, she starts to dream of her migratory flight ahead tomorrow. It's a daunting journey ahead flying nonstop across sub-Saharan Africa. She will need to travel south along the western coast before flying across to Mozambique and visiting the Congolese rainforests. She will keep going, climbing high above the seas, over Morocco, Spain, France and to England. With luck she should reach her nesting site on a sleepy housing estate in the South of England within 5 to 6 days. She has returned to the same nest for the last 5 years or so and here she will meet up with her lifelong partner and hope to raise two or even three chicks, if there is enough air born insects. She will be exhausted, dehydrated and hungry upon her arrival, having travelled through many more storms than normal due to Climate Change, and having to increase her miles travelled from her normal 6,000 miles to 7,000 miles, as she has to make some detours to avoid bad weather and search for ever decreasing insect supply. But she dreams happily about how she will celebrate when she gets there and joins her breeding partner and sing and swoop with the Swift Colony over the roof tops in England's summer skies. Imagine her horror and desperation if she arrives at her faithful nest and the building has been demolished! Gone, forever! Her sweet dream has just turned into the perfect Nightmare!
Sadly, this scenario is unfolding right across our country. We are pushing out wildlife, with our need for new homes and maintenance. Swifts need our help, losing their nest space is catastrophic for them as they are nest-faithful and will not breed for the rest of that year and possibly never again. Common Swifts (Apus Apus) were added to the Red List of Bird of Conservation Concern in the UK in Dec 2021. This was because of a severe, long-term decline, with a population drop by 58% to 60% between 1995 and 2021.
At the Guildford Swift Project, we are doing everything we can to help turn the tide on this decline. Primarily, we install swift boxes and callers in homes, schools, churches, universities and other public buildings to provide them with new nesting sites. We protect existing nesting sites and report wildlife crimes where necessary. We also raise awareness and run educational projects such as stalls, lectures and walk & talks to teach people about these wonderful birds. Soon we will be launching a citizen science survey of our local swift population together with Surrey Wildlife Trust.
If you would like to help with our project, or would like a swift box of your own, please contact us. Conservation is a community effort and together we can save these birds.
Sarah Davis, Guildford Swift Project
Sarah has lots of events happening during Swift Awareness Week Saturday 27th June - 5th July and over the summer. Check out our events page or head to the Guildford Swift Project page on the ZERO website.
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