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A Subadult Common Swift Was Tracked in Non-stop Flight for 19 Months

Common swift in flight
Research · Ecology

A subadult common swift (Apus apus) remained in continuously monitored flight for 19 months, providing an unusually long record of how a young bird moves before entering the breeding population. The study was published online on 19 March 2026 in Ringing & Migration.

The bird was followed from the Ghent Voorhaven research site in Belgium and used non-breeding areas in eastern Africa, including Malawi and Mozambique. It carried a multi-sensor data logger that recorded information across migration and the non-breeding period. The researchers compared its movements with patterns previously documented in adult swifts, including migration routes, locations visited and flight altitude.

The young bird broadly resembled adults

The subadult’s migration patterns and flight altitudes were similar to those known from adult common swifts. Its non-breeding flight activity also followed the moonlight-related pattern described for adults, in which activity changes with the lunar cycle.

The authors suggest that the similarities may reflect a combination of inherited behaviour and experience gained during the relatively long subadult stage of this long-lived species. Their data do not separate these possibilities.

Breeding-season flight differed from the moonlight pattern

During the breeding season, the bird’s flight activity deviated from the moonlight-driven pattern seen during the non-breeding period. The researchers identify anthropogenic skyglow as a possible influence and argue that the result opens new questions about how artificial light may affect swift foraging and flight behaviour.

Sources and image credit

  1. Kearsley, L., Meier, C. M., Fox, J. W., Vercauteren, S., Van Gysel, A., & Hufkens, K. (2026). Insights from tracking a 19-month non-stop flight of a subadult Common Swift. Ringing & Migration, 40(2), 131–140. https://doi.org/10.1080/03078698.2026.2640805Primary peer-reviewed study, published online 19 March 2026. A multi-sensor logger provided 19 months of continuous monitored flight from one subadult common swift; migration routes, locations, altitude and the non-breeding moonlight-driven flight pattern broadly resembled adult patterns.

Image: Alexis Lours — common swift (Apus apus) in flight; Wikimedia Commons; cropped to 16:9 for Wildlife Vagabond; representative species image, not the tracked bird · CC BY 4.0 · Source

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