Friday Feathered Feature
Showcasing a different bird species each week
What draws most people’s attention to Chimney Swifts in the fall is their incredible roosting behavior. Chimney Swifts spend 90% of their lives flying—only pausing their lives on-the-wing to roost and to nest. They eat, sleep, mate, and bathe while flying. In migration, flocks of Chimney Swifts roost in—you guessed it—chimneys, clinging with their feet to the walls while they sleep.
Photo by Steve Benoit FCC
As we turn the corner into September, bird-watchers look to the skies. Birds of all sorts are on the move, some new to migration or making the return trip yet again. Soon, warblers will begin migrating from northern Wisconsin to Central America, bugling sandhill cranes will make their way to the Gulf Coast, and American kestrels will take the short trip to Illinois.
Photo by Brenna Marsicek/SoWBA
Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s a... flying cigar!? The generations of people that grew up with Superman remember the opening statements of the 1950s TV show, except perhaps for the "flying cigar" addition. What the heck are we talking about? Chimney swifts, of course!
Photo by Joni Denker
