RSPB Spotlight Swifts and Swallows
By Mike Unwin
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About this ebook
People all over Britain and Europe have long welcomed the arrival of swifts and swallows as a promise of summer being just around the corner. And with their similar long wings and dashing flight, it is perhaps understandable that we often confuse the two birds.
After all, they have much in common: both feed on flying insects, both breed around buildings, and both are long-distance migrants that spend winter in Africa. But appearances can be deceptive. Swifts and swallows are completely unrelated birds that have adapted through evolution to survive in similar ways. In Spotlight: Swifts and Swallows, Mike Unwin reveals their fascinating lifestyles, explains how and why they have acquired their similarities, and ways in which we can help protect them.
The Spotlight series introduces readers to the lives and behaviour of our favourite animals with eye-catching colour photography and informative expert text.
Mike Unwin
Mike Unwin is a freelance writer, editor and illustrator with over 13 years' experience in natural history publishing. In 2000 he won the BBC Wildlife travel-writing competition. His children's titles include the bestselling RSPB My First Book of Garden Birds and My First Book of Garden Wildlife.
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RSPB Spotlight Swifts and Swallows - Mike Unwin
Contents
Meet the Swift and the Swallow
Ancestors and Relatives
Built for Flight
An Airborne Menu
Born in a Tower
Born in a Barn
Globetrotters
Life and Death
Icons of Summer
Protecting Swifts and Swallows
Glossary
Further Reading and Resources
Acknowledgements
Image Credits
When a Swift is perched, its exceptionally long wings project well beyond the end of its tail.
Meet the Swift and the Swallow
Darting and gliding through the summer skies, few birds are more impressive in the air than the Swift and the Swallow. The two have much in common: both feed on flying insects and have bodies similarly adapted for this challenge; both breed on or around buildings, bringing them into close contact with people; and both are long-distance migrants, arriving in the UK every spring after spending winter in sub-Saharan Africa. Given these similarities, and the superficial resemblance of the two birds, it is hardly surprising that they have long been closely associated. Indeed, many people often mistake one for the other.
Appearances, however, can be deceptive. Swifts and swallows are not related. Swallows belong to the order Passeriformes – also known as passerines, or perching birds. This is the world’s largest order of birds and comprises at least 110 families, including the likes of thrushes, finches and warblers. Within this order, the swallows make up the family Hirundinidae, known as hirundines, of which our UK Swallow – properly known as the Barn Swallow – is one of some 83 species.
Swifts, however apparently similar to swallows, belong to the Apodiformes, a completely different and much smaller order that comprises just three families. Our UK Swift is one of some 100 species in the family Apodidae. Its two sister families in this small order are the tree swifts (Hemiprocnidae) and, believe it or not, the hummingbirds (Trochilidae). Swifts are thus much more closely related to hummingbirds than they are to swallows, and swallows are more closely related to magpies and robins than they are to swifts.
Unlike Swifts, Swallows habitually settle on fences, posts and other low perches.
These affinities may seem counter-intuitive. But the striking similarities between swifts and swallows are due to a phenomenon known as ‘convergent evolution’, in which animals from unconnected evolutionary roots evolve to resemble one another by adapting in similar ways to a shared environmental challenge. In this case, the challenge is catching flying insects on the wing, one that demands a special skill set and a body customised to the job.
Seen from side-on, a Swift reveals the aerodynamic lines of its body.
Growing together; moving apart
Unrelated species can evolve similar outward traits by adapting in similar ways to shared environmental challenges. This is called convergent evolution. The species in question have ‘converged’ from different backgrounds towards a similar point, which is usually reflected in their build or behaviour. Swifts and swallows, for instance, both have long, narrow wings, forked tails, tiny feet, small bills, wide mouths and agile flight as adaptations for catching insects on the wing. Hummingbirds, on the other hand, which are related to swifts, have adapted to a very different lifestyle – one of hovering in front of flowers in order to extract their nectar – and so are quite different in appearance. This is an example of divergent evolution.
Both the Swift (left) and Swallow (right) share a similar aerodynamic profile, with long wings and a short head.
Meet the Swift
A close view of a Swift reveals the protective feathering that helps shield the eyes during high-speed flight.
The Swift – the one member of the Apodidae found in the UK – is properly known as the Common or Eurasian Swift, to distinguish it from other swift species around the world. For the purposes of this book, however, it is generally referred to as simply ‘Swift’, since this is the term most commonly used in the UK. Its scientific name Apus apus derives from the Greek word ἄπους, meaning ‘without feet’. This refers to the ancient belief that swifts, whose tiny legs are barely visible to the casual observer, are simply legless swallows. The Common Swift was the first swift species to be scientifically described and has thus given its name to the Apodiformes order, embracing all swifts worldwide. We can only presume that the great Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus, who first described these birds in the tenth edition of his groundbreaking Systema Naturae (1758), would have known that swifts’ legs, however diminutive, do exist.
Swifts in close-up
Whatever the science, the adjective ‘swift’ is the perfect name for this speediest of flyers. Indeed, few birds are swifter. The White-throated Needletail, a Himalayan relative of our Swift, has been clocked at an astonishing 169km/h (105mph), making it the fastest recorded bird in the world in level flight – a speed topped only by the Peregrine Falcon in a vertical dive. Our own Swift has been recorded at an impressive 111.6km/h (69.3mph) and, when hurtling above the rooftops, can appear much faster.
The crescent or boomerang shape of a Swift in flight is like that of no other bird.
Size is hard to judge in flying birds. Seen dashing overhead, Swifts and Swallows may appear about the same. In fact, the Swift is appreciably bigger. Topping the scales at 35–56g (1.2–1.9oz), it is heavier than a House Sparrow and weighs nearly twice as much as a Swallow. Its wingspan of 38–40cm (15–16in) is also greater than a Swallow’s, at 32–34.5cm (12.6–13.6in). Without a Swallow’s long tail streamers however, its overall body length of 16–17cm (6.3–6.7in) is generally slightly less.
Size apart, you don’t need binoculars to see that a Swift is quite different from a Swallow – and indeed any other bird. In colour, it is dark sooty brown, apart from a paleish patch on the chin, and appears black unless seen in good light. In its flight silhouette it resembles a crescent or boomerang, in which the two wings form one continuous swept-back curve that is unlike any other bird’s. Other features all exhibit an aerodynamic unobtrusiveness: at the front, a rounded head with no visible neck and a short, barely visible bill; at the back, a short tail with a shallow fork that is often held closed. When perched – which is something you will seldom see – its exceptionally long wings extend well beyond the end of its tail.
This rakish shape and dark plumage, combined with distinctive stiff wingbeats, gives a flying Swift a very different character from any other bird. Combined with its screaming call and predilection for zooming around church towers at dusk, it helps explain how the Swift acquired its traditional name of ‘devil bird’.
Where Swifts live
The Common Swift is the most widely distributed of all swift species. It occupies a total estimated breeding area of 39,800,000km² (15,367,000 square miles) across Europe and Asia, ranging from Spain in the west to Siberia in the east and, north to south, from Norway to Morocco. Birds from all these regions migrate south to spend winter in sub-Saharan Africa, from the equatorial centre south to northern South Africa.
On the map above the breeding range of the Common Swift is indicated in orange and its winter quarters in blue.
Across this range, Swifts occupy many habitats and, during their wanderings, you can see them over almost any landscape. In effect their habitat is the air rather than the land, and they travel wherever they can find a steady supply of flying insects, from sea level to heights of over 4,000m (13,100ft) in the Himalayas. Before human times, their breeding sites comprised regions with crags and sea cliffs, which offered suitable crevices and caves for nests. But their adoption of buildings as nest sites means that today they also frequent urban habitats – indeed, in many areas they breed only in man-made structures.
The worldwide population of the Common Swift is estimated at 25 million birds, which means that it is classified by the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) as Least Concern. In some regions, however, the species is in decline – including in the UK (see here), where the current estimated breeding population of 87,000 pairs represents a decline of 51 per cent since 1995, placing the Swift firmly on the Amber List of Birds of Conservation Concern.
A pair of Swifts at their nest cavity in an old wooden building in Manheim, Germany.
How Swifts live
Swifts feed on the countless insects and other tiny invertebrates, known collectively as ‘aerial plankton’, that fill our summer skies, catching it in their gaping mouths. Their dependence upon this diet explains why Swifts are such masterful flyers, both fast and agile enough to catch their food and, because the supply is often very irregular, able to travel great distances to find it. In areas of plenty, Swifts may gather in large feeding parties, sometimes hundreds or even thousands strong.
Aerial plankton is long gone by winter, which explains why Swifts are summer visitors to UK skies. Indeed, they spend the shortest time here of all summer visitors, arriving in late April/early May and departing in late July/early August. This short sojourn is balanced by a similar length of time in Africa during winter, with the rest of their year spent travelling between the two.
When Swifts arrive in Britain in late spring they fly straight to their nest sites, usually clustered in loose colonies of several