Timiskaming Birds Forum

Hi folks was wondering if we could add something to our busy lives. I cannot stop thinking about the plight of chimney swifts and was wondering what we could do and if we should attempt to try to make the public aware and see if we can find some nesting chimneys and roosting chimneys and see what we can do to protect them. There may be some funding available that we can apply in the fall for them but for this summer we may wish to do something to get organized. I would be happy to coordinate a meeting or is this something we can do over the forum or by some other means.  I would like to see the |Hilliardton marsh bird wetland research and education center take an active role in this  but thought we should be getting organized now . Perhaps we could also have the terra students put togetehr a poster display and have them set somethign up at the mall . i think there are lots of ideas we could come up with but we just need to get organized. Looking forward to hearing from anyone interested . |Murph 

 I've never seen a Chimney Swift that I can remember, and towards the end of spotting one, I have mentally plotted 4 seemingly abandoned buildings with appropriate chimneys in the Tomstown area that I am interested in observing for a while during an appropriate time period. Perhaps others could do the same... I see that Chimney Swift is on the list of bird species at the marsh. Has this been documented? Do you have specifics of the sightings? The idea of an artificial structure at the marsh and elsewhere is not without merit, but such efforts should be done only if the chances of success are relatively high. (Birds nearby)

the artificial swift structures are on hold for the moment as they have not worked very well in northen climates due to the fact that they get too cold the current thinking is to make sure that existing chimneys are taken care of  especially roosting chimneys as well as nesting ones. Rick caldwell was telling me that a church replaced a chimney and the birds ahve not returned so that is a huge loss for the area he said there used to be 50 birds using it in newliskeard. I oftren see swifts at the Hialeybury golf course in the evening I think in late July and August but I will have to focus more in the spring on their arrival time and see whre they go. We saw a small number of chimney swifts at the marsh as recetly as last July it was the first time i had noticed them in recent memeory and it made me think of the artificail structure not sure where they would be nesting but they also nest in cavities in trees. I imagine finding roost and chimneys could be very difficult without the larger public getting in touch. I think the few of us tracking down these structures will prove futile. LOndon ontario hs done well with chimney swift conservation so perhaps we should look into how they did it but they also have a large active naturalist club. It would be good to know if the swifts are nesting in toms town as that could explain their prescence at the marsh which would be an excellent feeding ground and a short flight away. The other item i was a bit suprised by with regards to artificail chimneys is that you only get 1 pair of birds nesting in each chimney which makes it quite expensive to boost a population a pair at a time.  I have contact info at school regarding more information that i can send anyone who wants to know more about the swifts I will post a link when i return to work on monday. Great to hear frorm you on this Serge thanks

50 birds in the same chimney are more likely non-breeding birds.

Swifts never go very far away from chimney when nesting.  That can be detected in june and early july.  If birds fly all day without disapearing from your sight, it might not be nesting.  The easier way is to first find out where they spend the night.  In the next days you can see if birds are frequently coming back to the chimney during the day.  If so, they are nesting.  If they stay up in the air all day, they feed for themselves only.

I'm pretty sure number of birds has gone up last year after 2006 big crash.