21 April 2011

Eastern Omaha Swifts Chimney Future Uncertain

An apartment house with a chimney well known to Chimney Swifts currently sits abandoned in eastern Omaha.

The Nottingham Apartments, at 33rd and Burt Streets, is a prominent chimney in the neighborhood, and is known to be regularly used by hundreds of swifts during the autumn migration. There were about 350 counted one evening in mid-September 2008.

The building is now uninhabited - with windows and entries boarded over - and has been for sale for several months.

Apartment house chimney on April 20, 2011.

The two adjacent houses to the west are also boarded up.

What the future portends for this apartment houses is uncertain, but the loss of this particular chimney would be a significant loss of a roosting site used by numerous Chimney Swifts. It would also continue the trend in the loss of chimneys in the local area.