Vaux's Swifts return to Downtown

The migrating Vaux's Swifts have returned, as they have each fall for the past few years, to the unused chimney of the old Chester Williams Building at 5th and Broadway. Sightings are best at dusk, when thousands of birds swarm back to the roost. "It’ll be happening for another week or so, maybe two," emails Garrison Frost of the National Audobon Society.

The Audubon Center at Debs Park hosts Friday evening viewing parties on the top floor of Joe’s Auto Park at 440 S. Broadway from 6 to 7:30 p.m. It costs $3 to park. Audubon staff and volunteers will be on hand to share information, binoculars. "If you think you’ve seen everything in downtown Los Angeles, you’ve never seen anything like this,” says the group's Jeff Chapman.

Photo: Martha Benedict