SWALLOWS 



I>laces. One very conspicuous jilace where there 

 was an immense colony was on the face of tlie 

 luLjh bkiffs near the confluence of the Xiobrara 

 and Missouri rivers. As the settlements be- 

 came established in the northwest the Cliff 

 Swallows deserted the rocks in great numbers 

 and became residents imder the eaves cif the 

 farmers' barns. 



They are unusually interesting birds in these 

 large colonies. The air is full of Swallows 

 where there are a few dozen mud bottles along 

 under the eaves of a great barn. Going ever to 

 and fro. in and out of the bottle nests, uttering 

 their single notes continuously, it seems indeed 

 a very busy place. But the individual birds are 

 not in as much of a hurry as the collection seems 

 to be. Many little chestnut-throated birds will 

 be peering out of their nests, others leisurely fly- 

 ing backward and forward in front of the nests 

 as thoitgb the\' were on inspection. AIan_\' 

 more are coming in from far distant insect- 

 infected areas with food for the voung. Others, 

 having chattered abotit for a little after feeding 

 the young, are off with the directness of arr(iw< 

 and are soon out of sight. In any area within 

 a few miles and where insects breed to fill the 

 air, these Eave .Swallows are up and down, and 

 over and under, now down near the marsh or 

 water, now flying high anrl rounrl and round in 

 circles ; and then suddenly off with arrow-like 

 directness in the direction of the home barn. 



When the young are ready to come out of the 

 nest the chattering increases enormouslv. The 

 young hang on to the outside of the nests ap- 

 ])arently fearful to try their wings. Rut once 

 launched they soon become accpiainted with all 

 the methods of wheeling and turning, up-^^hots 

 and down-dippings, to catch the warv insect on 

 the wing. Then the whole colonv deserts the 

 eaves in a few da}s. ( Jccasionally a pair i> de- 

 layed behind the others by later hatchings, but it 

 is not many days before they are all gone from 

 the neighborhood. 



The flocks of Bank, Barn, and Tree Swal- 

 lows absorb these Eave Swallows, and to- 

 gether they work to clean the air of the inland 

 lakes of all the flies and mosquitoes. They 

 are up and down over the rivers and swamps and 

 wheeling about over grain fields and pastures 

 .Sometimes they are in himdreds, sometimes in 

 thousands, but always a good proportion of these 

 summer and fall flocks are Cliff Swallows. Then 

 if one goes into the salt marshes of the south, he 

 will find tens of thousands that are on their way 

 for tropical insects for the winter. 



The Lesser Cliff' .Swallow { I'ctrucliclidon liiiii- 

 f rolls tachina) and the Mexican, or .SwainsonV, 

 Cliff' Swallow (Pcti-dchclidan liniifrDiis iiirldiui- 

 tjastra) are inhabitants of Mexico and countries 

 U.) the south. Tiie former comes over the bound- 

 ary into Texas to breed, and the latter visits 

 Arizona for the same purjjose. Both are smaller 

 than their more widely distributed relative. The 

 frontal patch of the I.esscr Cliff Swallow is 

 fawn color, dull cinn.imon, nr wood brown: that 

 of the Mexican Cb'ff Swallow is chestnut or 

 cinnamon-rufous. 



id/g^ 



Photo by P. B. Philipp Courtesy of Nat. Ass 



NESTS OF CLIFF SWALLOWS 



Cleverly constructed retort- or bottle-shaped i 



An analysis of the stomach contents of 123 

 Cliff' .Swallows showed about one-third of i per 

 cent, vegetable matter; this included a few seeds 

 but it was mostly rubbish taken accidentally. In 

 the animal matter, ants, bees, and wasps, 

 amounted to about 39 jier cent. Xo worker bees 

 were found ; and as bee-keepers do not regard the 

 destruction of drones as injurious to the swarms 

 this cannot be counted against the Swallows. 

 Bugs — assassin-bugs, leaf-bugs, squash-bugs, 

 stink-bugs, shield-bugs, tree-hoppers, leaf-hop- 

 pers, and jumping plant-lice — formed about JJ 

 per cent. Beetles of all kinds aggregated a little 

 less than 19 per cent.; of these, 17 per cent, 

 were harmful, some very much so. Gnats, 

 dragon-flies, lace-winged flies, and spiders com- 

 pleted the menu. 



The young are fed exactly the same kind of 

 food that their elders eat, but the proportions 

 vary. The soft-bodied insects are more often 

 chosen by the parents for the nestlings as thev 

 are more easily digested. Adult Cliff Swallows 

 do not take gravel themselves, but thev feed it 

 to the young. 



L. Nel.son Nichols. 



