The German Apus Association evolved from Dr. med. vet. Christiane Haupt's „Mobile Bird Aid“ and its successor the "Swift Station", which developed further into today's Swift Rescue Center.
While initially running the project all alone, Dr. Haupt quickly realized that she had to find fellow activists to be able to handle the steadily increasing workload and keep the project financially affordable. Using the local and regional press, she asked for support and donations for the all-voluntary and donation-financed Swift Station. Especially the enormous cost for insects, needed to feed the swifts, posed a problem for Dr. Haupt, who was a student of veterinary medicine back then. She decided to found an association with the legal form of "eingetragener Verein, e.V.", after someone brought her a swift, donated for its treatment, and asked for a donation receipt: „If only you could give me a donation receipt...“ Given that the legal requirements are met, financial authorities certify e.V.s as charitable, which makes donations tax deductable.
Sitting in a desperately small basement flat between boxes full of feathered patients, paper towels, feeding equipment, and medicine as well as a glance at her empty bank account and a pile of bills for insects provided sufficient motivation to work through the legal requirements and regulations to found an e.V.
In early years, Dr. Haupt also benefitted from Erich Kaiser's support. He is a well-known swift expert from Kronberg, who at this time already had a colony with some 40 swifts, whose behavior he has observed for over 30 years. He stood by Christiane Haupt and her Swift Station with advice and practical help, and was also present at many swift releases and relocations. Ornithologist and veterinarian revealed to be a „winning team“ for the swifts.
With a couple of fellows, Christiane Haupt and Erich Kaiser teamed up to found the "Deutsche Gesellschaft für Mauersegler e.V.": on January, 29th 2000, the founding meeting of the future association took place in Kronberg / Taunus!
Christiane Haupt was elected president and Erich Kaiser Vice President of the new association. An attorney from Neuss, Robert von Meyer, who found a juvenile swift that was treated in the small Frankfurt station one year before, developed the mandatory statutes. On February, 21st 2000, the association received the status of a charitable organization. On March, 25th 2000, the association presented itself to the public: In the community hall in Frankfurt-Zeilsheim, Dr. Haupt gave a detailed slide presentation on "Swifts under Human Care" and Mr. Kaiser gave a presentation on the breeding behavior of swifts.
Since then, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Mauersegler e.V. (DGfM) grew steadily and developed a network with members and supporters inside and outside of Germany, and has so far been able to keep the progressively expanding Swift Station / Swift Rescue Center financially afloat. This nationwide only and unique care facility for swifts still is the association's dominating and most cost-intensive project, and it can only be funded at present because all helpers and staff work on a voluntary basis and the veterinary care is provided by the president. Thanks to the great acceptance among many sponsors and small donors, our sound financial situation has enabled us to fund three half-time positions, whose holders are of course not members.
The clinic's growing public profile, not least through the DGfM's website, will however also in future lead to an ever greater discrepancy between the rising number of patients and the association's financial, personnel and spatial limits. Soon after the association was founded, the Swift Station moved into an empty flat, provided for free by a member, but before long these rooms also proved too small. This led to the intolerable situation that, on the one hand, there were always too few volunteers, while on the other hand there was just no room for their training. So in 2012 the Swift Rescue Center moved into 180 square metres which are, admittedly, no longer free of charge, but which after many years of cramped conditions are at last sufficiently large.
Meanwhile, the association proudly welcomed its 298th member. But funding still remains the major issue of concern: While membership fees provide a rather solid, calculable base, they are by no means sufficient to fund the association's operations and especially the clinic. So, of course, donations from individuals as well as from private and public institutions are still more than welcome and – in the absence of secured, regular public funding – indispensable to keep up the clinic's operations.