Manitoba Chimney Swift Initiative Monitoring 2018 – Part 4, Tracking Down Swifts in New Communities Across Manitoba
In 2017, Marshall Birch, a former summer student with the Manitoba IBA Program, completed a GIS project with MCSI. For anyone not familiar with GIS, it stands for Geographical Information Systems. These are incredibly powerful computer modelling programs, and among their many uses, can be used to map information and use that information to build predictive models based on the information provided. In this case, Marshall was able to create a predictive model for Chimney Swift habitat in Manitoba. As part of his model, he estimated, based habitat and land-use information, where we might find Chimney Swifts in the Province of Manitoba. If anyone is interested, his report is posted on our website at
Ahead of the new season, Lynnea Parker, who is now working as an intern on bird projects with Nature Manitoba, has looked over the list of possible sites, and tried to work out which ones have potential for swift habitat (suitable chimneys). Marshall’s model could predict whether towns and cities met certain criteria, such as proximity to certain habitats, age of settlement and even in some cases, spraying of insecticide, but it could not know whether a settlement had suitable chimneys. Lynnea based her search on a few resources such as the excellent Manitoba Historical Society website and Google Streetview. She came up with a rudimentary system of high likelihood (meaning there are a few good looking chimneys), through to very unlikely (meaning there were no obvious chimneys). You can see the list of towns in the attached – and by clicking the link where we mapped them – https://drive.google.com/opeCheck out the list of potential sites at
In a few cases, we have ground-truthed some of these settlements, and we were delighted to find that the search by Lynnea appeared to correspond well with what was present on the ground,i.e. there were suitable chimneys. However, what we would love to do is ground truth the model now, and see if there are swifts in many of these towns that Marshall’s project predicted.
The challenge we are therefore setting to Manitoba’s birding community is to get out and look when you are out and about. For example, if you have a cottage near Pelican Lake, then would it be possible to take an evening stroll in Dunrea or Ninette to look for swifts? Or if you are on a birding trip to Riding Mountain, rather than stop in on the excellent Wasagaming sites, maybe check out Erickson instead. And why not take an evening stroll in Lockport with an ice cream and look for some swifts? In Morden, it’s about time someone sat out at the Pembina Arts Centre and determined once and for all if swifts are using that site.
If you are interested in checking one or more of the towns on the map, then please let us know!
– Tim Poole for the MCSI team
Here is the crux – we need lots of help, as we would like to get as many days of monitoring covered on both these projects as possible. This would primarily be required during the roosting hour (half an hour either side of sundown). If you are able to help at any time from May 20th onwards, please contact Tim Poole at 
In part 2 of our series of blogs on monitoring opportunities with MCSI in 2018, we are going to give a bit more information on doing other monitoring that you can do outside of the NRMP nights.
For some, watching throughout the season has its reward when you see the signs of fledged swifts making their way in and out of the chimney. In 2017, Margaret and Millie recorded the latest known fledging date ever recorded in Manitoba, when their swifts were practicing entries and exits in late August. If you wish to know more about how to identify recently fledged swifts, then please let us know.
*: Data source: Bird Studies Canada, Manitoba Chimney Swift Initiative, Environment and Climate change Canada, Canadian Wildlife Service
As the warm brightness of March fades away, to be replaced by the cold starkness of April, I am sure that very few of us are thinking about Chimney Swifts! However, this is the perfect time to prepare for the arrival of our feathered friends, with just a month to go before the season kicks into gear.
Finally, we have just checked the current migration status of Chimney Swift on eBird. Sightings are pretty widespread across the southeastern USA. The most northern record is in Ohio, and most northwesterly is in Arizona. However, and to no ones surprise, indications are that migration is currently in a 
Our latest Swift Champion plaque was presented recently to Lewis Cocks. Many of you will already be familiar with Lewis as a longtime supporter of Chimney Swift conservation in Manitoba. Indeed, Lewis was the closest we have to a founder of MCSI – it was his idea to do something for Chimney Swifts and he was the initial driving force in setting up what we now call the Manitoba Chimney Swift Initiative. Below Lewis answers a few questions about his involvement as a champion of Chimney Swift conservation in Manitoba.
Thank you once more to all our volunteers who spent hours in sunshine, wind and rain collecting Chimney Swift data in 2017. The fruits of your labours can be found in two datasets which we uploaded to the MCSI website today.
Finally, thank you once more for everyone who made 2017 such a special monitoring year for the Manitoba Chimney Swift Initiative. You can see just by looking at the number of sites monitored in 2017 that this has been an absolutely phenomenal year.