Hi, tonight I did my first survey of Corvallis chimneys to count northward
migrating Vaux’s Swifts. As locals may know, there are a lot of chimneys in
Corvallis to monitor, and I learned about a new one tonight to add to the fun.
I didn’t observe any swifts until I got to Weigand Hall on campus.
Weigand Hall was the hot spot with probably 125 gathering into a loose vortex
right around sunset, until an accipiter (I suspect Sharpie, but could have been
Cooper’s as I didn’t see it until it was a quickly diminishing dot) scattered
them. Only 12 swifts eventually came along to go into the chimney at Weigand.
Where the others went, I don’t know.
While I was hanging out waiting, Keith and Linda came along and watched with
me. They told me about seeing, several autumns several years ago, a vortex of
swifts across the Willamette from the southern part of Willamette Landing where
the path opens up past the woods. They were too far away to count, but estimate
that there could have been a thousand or more. So, another potential site to
monitor.
For anyone interested, if you observe swifts going into any chimneys in the
evening (or coming out in the morning but you have to get up early…), please
post the location to one of these lists. And if you are so inclined you could
enter your observations in the VauxHappening website. Larry Schwitters has been
keeping track of these observations for years and the website has a lot of
interesting information about the wee birds as well as live webcams and other
fun links (website address below).
These are the locations of some of the chimneys on public buildings that have
been used by swifts in the past that I know of:
Weigand Hall on campus
Phi Delta Theta Fraternity at 120 NW 13 St
Whiteside Theater
Chimney on the building on the north side of the parking lot behind Mongolian
Grill (observable from Sky High Brewing!)
There are others at residences that I am aware of but I hesitate to post them
here as I don’t want anyone to feel a loss of privacy.
http://www.vauxhappening.org ;<http://www.vauxhappening.org/>
Happy swifting!
Mary Garrard
