10.18.26: Swallow at home

‍I know that winter is over and better weather is coming when I see the first Tree Swallow in the fields in Central Ohio.

‍The birds are hard to miss as they do their aerial acrobatics while chasing flying insects. They will quickly change speed or direction, suddenly dive or at times stop and hover mid-flight to grab their meal.

‍During the rare moments when they aren’t in flight, you can see Tree Swallows engage in lively debates over nesting rights. 

‍During the spring breeding season, the Tree Swallows are in a never-ending battle with Eastern Bluebirds over nesting spots. Both species are cavity dwellers, making homes in hollow trees or in nesting boxes, so the many bluebird nesting boxes erected by naturalists to help revive the bluebird population can become Tree Swallow nesting boxes. 

‍If you spend time watching a nesting box on a spring day, you will likely see control change dozens of times until one species establishes its nest.

‍I grabbed this photo of a female Tree Swallow perched outside a more-natural nesting spot — a cavity in a tree — in 2016 during a visit to Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge along Lake Erie in northern Ohio. I was in the area to photograph migrating warblers that gather in the area during spring migration, but I saw much more than warblers during those visits.

‍Both the male and female swallows made repeated visits to the nest. It was difficult to determine if they were in nest-building mode or if they were tending to eggs, but it was obvious this was their nesting site.

‍Adult males are blue-green above and white below. Females are duller with more brown in their upper parts.

‍I mentioned the fact that Tree Swallows are aerial acrobats when chasing the insects they eat. The same acrobatics comes into play when they bathe or build nests. When bathing, a Tree Swallow flies low over the water and skims along the surface before rising quickly to dry by shaking off droplets. Nest building can turn into a bit of a game. According to the website All About Birds, "Tree Swallows line their nests with feathers, and they seem to display or even play with these feathers during the early nesting season. A bird flies above the nest with a feather held in its bill; sometimes this leads to chases, and sometimes the bird drops the feather, causing an aerial free-for-all to see which bird retrieves it.”