Waterloo Students Get New Home for Small Birds

WATERLOO, Iowa (AP)   Students no longer will have to worry about where small birds that nested in the chimney of an old school slated for demolition will live next.

Workers last week installed a 14-foot tall structure that looks like the chimney near the former Orange Elementary School. Students decorated the tower by scribbling their names and tracing outlines of their hands on it.

A teacher applied for two grants totaling $800 to cover the costs of building the free-standing structure. She also is seeking more grant funds to build another tower near the former school.

Hundreds of the birds, called chimney swifts, make their home in the school's chimney.