BANK SWALLOW 405 



C. K. Stockard (1905) states: "On May 2 of this year I found a 

 Bank Swallow's nest placed in a Kin^rfisher's deserted tunnel. The 

 tunnel was six feet long, and three feet from the entrance it made a 

 bend of 45 degrees, and at this place the swallows had placed their 

 nest." We have no reason to suppose that Stockard was confused in 

 his identification, although it is well known that rough-winged swal- 

 lows nest in such situations, and furthermore this species is more 

 numerous as a nesting bird in Mississippi, where his observations 

 were made, than is the bank swallow. 



The depth of the nesting burrow varies somewhat, depending on 

 the texture of the material in which it is excavated. The average 

 depth of 20 nests located in a sand bank near Brunswick, Maine, 

 was 34 inches, the longest being 48 inches, whereas the average depth 

 of nine nests excavated in a clay bank where there were numerous 

 pebbles and larger stones was 19 inches, the shortest being only 14 

 inches. Stoner (1936b), in his study of the nests in the Oneida Lake 

 region of Xew York states : "Occasionally the birds constructed a nest 

 in a burrow not more than 16 or 18 inches in depth, but usually the 

 completed burrow was from 22 to 36 inches deep." For 89 occupied 

 burrows the average depth was 28 inches with a minimum of 15 inches 

 and a maximum of 47 inches. Burrows 40 to 50 inches in depth 

 were not uncommon, the deepest burrow which he measured was 65 

 inches. Stoner noted that burrows which are begun early in the 

 season, in soft sandy soil, are deeper as a rule than those begun later in 

 the season after ovulation has started. 



A burrow excavated in a colony near Topsham, Maine, had an 

 external opening measuring 1 by 2 inches. The burrow had a length 

 of 33 inches, and the cavity containing the nest measured roughly 

 3 by 41/^ by 6 inches. The nesting cavity was about 4 inches higher 

 than the entrance of the tunnel, which took an upward course. This 

 was true of many of the nests examined. Whether this is done 

 for a purpose one cannot be sure, but it does prevent water from 

 running into the nest during a heavy downpour of rain. Some of the 

 nests were built on a level, and a very few were even directed down- 

 ward. Stoner states that in general the burrows are excavated di- 

 rectly into the bank with the long axis approximately at right angles 

 to the face of the bank. An occasional one, however, may form an 

 acute angle with the base of the bank and thus comes to intersect 

 other burrows in its course. Sometimes also the sandy partitions be- 

 tween the adjacent burrows are so thin that they give way, two or 

 more burrows thus ending in a common chamber lying side by side. 

 Merrill (1881) found three burrows in a colony examined on the 

 Cranberry Islands, Maine, each of which contained two nests and all 

 nests contained fresh eggs. 



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