Tweets,

We just came back from the Monroe swifts and a Cafe Ladro stop in Bothell afterwards. It was just terrific--better than last year. I'd say there are at least 4,000 birds. (Well, one less than that, as a Merlin made
a successful hit after 3 failed tries.) We got there at 6:55 p.m. and there were only 300 or so birds visible. But soon they start arriving from who-knows-where and by 7:10 they had churned themselves into the
chimney-entering spiral. We watched 'til the last guy went in at about 7:45. It was like the miracle of the fishes and the loaves--they just kept coming. Towards the end they just go in striaght from the sky, about 25 ft.
up--it looks like reverse smoke. Our novice-birder friends were truly amazed, and 3 carloads of people stopped to ask what we were looking at--2 carloads had assumed they were bats!

To get there you go out 522 to Monroe and take the first exit, Main Street. Stay on Main at the sort of traffic circle thing. Just keep going and pass a high school on the hill, a middle school on the right on Main, and before
"downtown" you'll come to Monroe Elem. School on the left. You can see the brick chimney easily and shortly before 7 you'll see and hear the swifts. It's quite a spectacle, really, and if you have any half-birding friends,
this is the way to impress them. We had our scope which was useful to watch the Merlin perched in a tall conifer across the street and to get great views of the birds going into the chimney rump first. But binos or even the naked eye are good enuf.

Penny Koyama, Bothell
plkoyama at verizon.net