Vaux’s Swifts flying into a chimney. Photo courtesy of Dungeness River Nature Center
“Vaux’s Happening: 15 Million and Counting”
Presented by Larry Schwitters, Project Coordinator, Vaux's Happening
Saturday, March 18, 2023 at 6 PM
Rainshadow Hall at the Dungenss River Nature Center
$5 donation requested for River Center education programs.
Vaux's Swifts are amazing aerial acrobats that eat mosquitoes and other insects in flight. These aerial insectivores spend most of their time flying and clinging to surfaces similar to bats. According to Rosenberg et al. 2019 [https://www.3billionbirds.org/], we have lost 160 million (2 in 5) aerial insectivores like swifts since 1970. They don't need bird feeders, they need our old chimneys (with the flue shut
starting in April) to aid them in their migration north as well as for breeding. The Olympic National Park Visitor Center chimney in Port Angeles is an example of a chimney used for breeding by a pair of Vaux's Swifts.
Groups of roosting swifts can range from just a few to as many as 35,000 entering through the top of a single roosting spot at dusk.
Larry Schwitters
Larry Schwitters will share photographs and speak about Vaux’s Swifts and Audubon’s Vaux’s Happening Project which began in 2007. Studying swifts for several decades, he was instrumental in saving a chimney that is one of only two well-known big-number Vaux’s Swift roost sites in all of Washington State.
The chimney he helped save, now recognized as a “Partners in Flight Important Bird Area of Global Significance,” quickly expanded into an attempt to locate, raise awareness of, and hopefully preserve the important roost sites used by this species all along their migratory path. The project has now documented over 200 roosting sites from the Yukon to Guatemala used by over 20 million swifts in the last 30 migrations.
Admission to the presentation is free. However, we suggest a donation of $5.00 per person to support our ongoing education programs.
Click here to watch a short video of Vaux’s Swifts flying into a chimney in Port Angeles. Video courtesy of Dee Renee Ericks.