Educate Yourself About the Barn Swallow and Other Swallows
Barn Swallow
The Barn Swallow has a dark throat, blue-black above, cinnamon-buff or rich orange below, long-slender, pointed wings; wing tips are pulled back at the end of stroke, with not much gliding, deeply forked swallow-tail with white tail spot. Its length is 1-7in (15-19cm) Its wingspan is 15in (38cm) Its voice is a soft call “vit” or “kvik-kvik-kvik, vit-vit” and call is a long musical twitter with gutturals added in intervals. Their eggs are white, spotted with shades of brown. with 1 or 2 clutches consisting of 4-5 eggs. Female incubates with help from male for 13-17 days, and fledging for about 18-23 days. Both male and female feed their young. Males and females look alike.
The Barn Swallow possibly has the longest migration of any other North American land bird. Some Swallows will nest in Alaska and winter in Southern Argentina witch is a distance of about 7.000 miles (11.000 km). They are called the Ferraris of the bird world, built for speed and maneuvering, and watching these birds with their streamlined bodies dipping and gliding in the sky is really a treat. The Swallows are master insect eaters, and without them we would have a miserable time at the picnic table.
Once they used to be a primarily cave and crevice nester, but know you will mostly find them nesting in the shelters of barns, sheds, porches, caves, lakeside cliffs, and rock crevices. They usually nest in colonies, but sometimes they will nest alone, and both the male and female build the nest, by picking up mouthfuls of mud and mixing it with fine grass and lining it with white feather. They plaster the nest to a horizontal or vertical surface, and if available, securing it with a protruding nail.
Their weak feet and short legs are not built for perching in tree tops, you will find them sitting next to road sides, on utility wires, or any other open sitting spots. Their legs are not built for walking either, so you will rarely see a swallow come to the ground, but for gathering mud and grass. They drink and eat on the wing, snatching insects in the air and swooping down to skim a beakful of water from a pond.
If you like to attract Tree Swallows or Violet-green Swallows, (witch are common west of the Great Plains), having a large pond and providing bird houses with a 1 ½ inch entrance hole, or nest shelfs for the Barn Swallows might do the trick. Creating a mud puddle with a large enough area around it, where the birds can easily get airborne, might also entice them to visit your lovely bird feeding garden. Scattering some white chicken or duck feathers across the lawn can be irresistible temptations, and planting insect attracting perennials or shrubs will help as well.
