Swift Half SWIFT update -26th April 2011

• The fourth video update can be found by clicking here.
• 4 days (and nights) in, and our swift is still alone, we think - certainly I've still to hear a swift scream in the vicinity (or at all this year in fact) or two birds obviously togther around the house, since briefly at the weekend.
• Swift numbers in the county are picking up a little now, but still very few in number. It is early in the season though - I've never seen my first swifts in the UK earlier than 23rd April (as this year and last) and never later than the 25th April, but many people wait until May for their first swift sightings and its true to say that the big numbers of swifts don't often arrive until a good few days into May.
• That said, I feel quite sad watching our lone swift in the roof - and I don't feel much happier seeing him / her flying around the house on his / her own at present!
• More nest building (if you can call glueing one feather together with a spot of swift saliva - nest building). This swift is obviously set on breeding, is obviously 4 years old or more (the age at which most swifts become fertile breeders  - I'm still convinced its one of last year's adults because of its direct (and unseen) entrance to the roof, with no shilly-shallying about in the area. If that is indeed the case, it would probably make this individual at least 5 years old - but possibly no older owing to what I dug out of the roof in the winter of 2009 (a dead adult and an unhatched egg).
• There has been a marked change in the weather today also - after two incredible weeks of pretty-well unbroken hot (25c+) sunshine and very light wind, we have a stiff north-easterly today, good cloud cover and a temperature drop of 8 or 9c. The temperature drop is of no concern - but the wind is a little problematic for swifts coming in from the south.
• All of us at Swift Half await this bird's mate - and hope it arrives before Friday, when we are due some significant rain at last!