GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – A Green Bay brewing company, that’s known for making specialty beers, has a new creation for you to try.
“Swifts’ Night Ale” salutes the chimney swift–a bird whose population is on the decline in the area.
Bird City Green Bay came up with the idea, and Titletown Brewing took it from there.
Nancy Nabak is with Bird City Green Bay and spoke to WLUK.
“The chimney swift belongs to the swallow family. And it sort of has a short stubby body.”
The birds roost, nest and rest, inside the chimneys, using strong claws to cling to the walls. But that habitat may be going away.
Nabak says annual surveys indicate a swift population decline in the Green Bay area.
“Technology has changed, so chimneys aren’t being built anymore, and chimneys are also being capped or torn down.”
But help may be on the way.
Titletown Brewing Company in Green Bay created a specialty beverage called Swifts’ Night Ale.
Brewmaster David Oldenburg says the beer combines corn and dark-roasted malt inspired by the chimney swift itself.
“It’s light bodied. It’s really easy drinking, easy going. It’s kind of a light brown color like the birds. It’s highly-carbonated for a mainstream beer. I thought that it mimicked the way the birds kind of flit in and out of the chimneys, the bubbles flitting up the glass.”
The beer will be unveiled at The Titletown Tap Room Saturday night after this year’s chimney swift count.
A portion of the proceeds will go to Birds City Green Bay to fund programs to raise awareness about the swifts, and asking people to open their chimneys to the birds.
This isn’t the first conservation-libation for Titletown Brewing.
In recent years, craft beers featured the Snowy Owl, and the Piping Plover.
