Tonight we went to see the annual spectacle of the Vaux’s Swifts entering a night roost in a chimney near Healdsburg (details and location info here). Click on the photo above to see larger views, which show the number of birds at that moment a little better.

There are literally thousands of swifts in the air. After circling for several minutes, the first group starts to enter the chimney as additional groups continue arriving from the surrounding hills. It goes on for almost an hour, with thousands of birds entering the chimney until they seem to spill out and start trying to grab hold on the outside.

It’s an amazing phenomena, and I’m glad we finally got ourselves up there in time to see it!

See the swifts yourself!

Update! Steve got great video that shows some of the swifts whirling above the chimney:

Saturday was the first day of our hawk watch season. I really enjoying seeing our teammates after the long break (click on the photo of Steve to see more photos from the day)! And we saw some good birds.

We also got to review landmarks. Here’s the outline of Elvis we made a couple years ago:

Before we started counting, three Red-tails floated up next to the hill, close in to us. It was a nice welcome.