Chimney Swift

Chaetura pelagica

The chimney swift is a bird belonging to the swift family Apodidae. A member of the genus Chaetura, it is closely related to both Vaux's swift and Chapman's swift; in the past, the three were sometimes considered to be conspecific. It has no subspecies. The chimney swift is a medium-sized, sooty gray bird with very long, slender wings and very short legs. Like all swifts, it is incapable of perching on flat surfaces, and can only perch on vertical surfaces. Many fly around all day and only come down at night when roosting. Source

Where it is now

In the last 8 weeks this bird was recorded 411,323 times across 42 areas (each area is a 5 degree square).

See the Chimney Swift on the live map

Movement and weather

Each season it is first heard regularly where daytime highs are around 24°C (typically 16 to 26°C, from 35 areas).

Over the weeks it was present in the past year, its centre in North America ranged from 30°N in April to 40°N in July, about 1,100 km apart.

Arrival dates

The week it was first heard regularly in each region, after at least six weeks away. Dates differ from south to north, so a region has a range.

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Figures are effort corrected and come from automatic sound identification, which makes mistakes. How this is measured and how it compares with human observers.