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Black Swifts Reach for the Moon
High-flying swifts seem to follow the moon’s cycles
© Chris Isherwood
Tracking devices revealed that Black Swifts spent over 99% of their time in the air during the winter, almost never touching the ground for months. What’s more, the swifts flew to incredible heights, reaching the highest altitudes on nights when the moon was full – sometimes over 13,000 feet! It’s the first time scientists have seen birds changing their altitude along with the cycles of the moon.
BirdNote®
Black Swifts Reach for the Moon
Written by Conor Gearin
This is BirdNote.
[Whistling wind]
[Black Swift flock calls]
Black Swifts are extraordinary birds. They spend most of their lives in the air and migrate thousands of miles every year. But researchers have found that their lifestyle is even stranger than we once knew.
[Black Swift calls]
Scientists placed lightweight tracking devices on swifts nesting in Colorado. This let them study their movements once they reached their wintering grounds in Brazil. This provided unprecedented access to the swift's world in the skies. Astonishingly, Black Swifts spent over 99% of their time in the air during the winter, almost never touching the ground for months.
What’s more, the swifts flew to incredible heights, reaching the highest altitudes on nights when the moon was full – sometimes over 13,000 feet! It’s the first time scientists have seen birds changing their altitude along with the cycles of the moon.
[Black Swift calls]
It’s still unknown why the moon seems to draw Black Swifts high into the sky. It’s possible that insects, many of which can also fly thousands of feet in the air, are attracted to the moon, and swifts follow their insect prey upward.
What is clear is that these birds have abilities beyond what our eyes can see.
[Black Swift calls]
For BirdNote, I’m Michael Stein.
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Senior Producer: John Kessler
Content Director: Allison Wilson
Producer: Mark Bramhill
Managing Editor: Jazzi Johnson
Managing Producer: Conor Gearin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Black Swift ML 363245171 recorded by Rose Ann Rowlett.
Black Swift Xeno Canto 677210 recorded by Richard E. Webster.
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2023 BirdNote March 2023
Narrator: Michael Stein
ID# BLSW-01-2023-03-10 BLSW-01
Reference:
https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(22)00397-9
Conor Gearin
Writer