St Anne's Primary School is the first Swift ambassador school in Navan!
Four Swift nest boxes have been attached to the front of the building to provide much needed nesting space for Navan's Swifts. Swifts are under threat from loss of nest sites, climate change, and declines in insect numbers. Swifts like to live where other Swifts live, so a caller system is needed to attract birds to a new nest site such as this one. You might see the young birds looking for a nest site: they will fly past prospective sites brushing or ‘banging’ the entrance with their wings to check if anyone is living there yet.
Look up: if you’re here in the morning or at dusk in the summer months, you will likely see Swifts swooping in the skies above.
Listen: can you hear the Swift caller system, or perhaps the Swifts themselves? (Swifts are migratory birds that call Navan home and live here between May and August).
HOW YOU CAN HELP: Check roofs and eaves in the summer before doing building renovations. Swifts are clean and fascinating birds and need all the help they can get as many have lost their nests in recent decades due to renovations blocking off their nest holes.