Swifts are such an iconic bird in the UK that they even have a whole week dedicated to them – Swift Awareness Week – which raises awareness about their conservation.

Are swifts common in the UK?

Though we still see swifts return to our shores each year, their soaring crowds are thinning out; their joyful screams muting. In fact, swift numbers have plummeted by 65 per cent in just 25 years.

Swifts are in decline because they have fewer places to breed and less food. They nest under the eaves of buildings or in crevices in walls, which is bad news when building refurbishments mean these nooks and crannies are lost. Then there is the issue with their sole food source: insects.

Swifts eat as many as 100,000 flying insects a day. It’s a huge energy requirement, and with insects declining at a faster rate than ever before, many swifts just can’t find enough food to sustain themselves.

How many miles do swifts migrate?

Swifts have one of the longest migration distances of any bird. They commute an incredible 14,000 miles (22,000km) every year, to and from Equatorial and Southern Africa, passing through the airspace of around 25 different countries en-route. And they do it fast, travelling at speeds of almost 70mph – reaching their destination in around four weeks’ time.

Even the swifts’ stay in the UK is a speedy one. They holiday here just long enough to breed: arriving in early May and leaving around mid-July.

Do swifts ever land?

The rumours you’ve heard are true… swifts rarely stop flying. In fact, the only time that swifts land after fledging is at their own nest, to feed their chicks, when they themselves have bred two or three years later. Other than this, swifts eat, mate, gather nest material and even sleep on the wing. It’s thought they do this by switching off one half of their brain during unihemispheric slow wave sleep (USWS), so one half can rest while the other stays active.

Swifts also have some other inventive techniques for survival. They drink by gliding over water and taking sips, or by catching raindrops. They bathe in much the same way, flying slowly through falling rain or ‘dusting’ themselves over waterbodies: smacking the surface of the water with their bodies before bouncing back up and shaking off the droplets.

Despite living life in the fast lane and weighing about the same as a Cadbury’s Crème Egg, swifts are incredibly long-lived birds. They can live up to 21 years, with an average lifespan of five and a half years – practically ancient compared to our robins, which survive for just 13 months on average.

What is special about swifts?

A more appropriate question might be ‘What isn’t special about swifts?’. If all of these swift facts haven’t managed to convince you just yet, here are some more incredible tit-bits.

While the peregrine falcon is the fastest bird when it dives into a stoop, the swift is the fastest of all birds in level flight, clocking in at 69.3pmh!

It’s thought that swifts could also be one of the oldest of our bird species, part of an ancient group called Apodidae. A crucial indication of this is a nightmarish-looking parasite unique to the common swift: the swift louse-fly. While all birds have some kind of feather lice or mites, these parasites are completely different, indicating that they evolved with the bird.