Sand Swallows {Rif ana r if aria) Nesting in Sawdust. — In the sum- 
mer of 1902, while I was in Franconia, N. H., Mrs. Annie Trumbull 
Slosson jointed out to me a pile of sawdust, on the perpendicular face of 
which, earlier in the season, she had noticed what seemed to be entrances 
to Sand Swallow nests. The pile is constantly being shovelled away, 
and at the time of my visit no holes were visible. 
This year (1903) Mrs. Slosson wrote me, under date of June 18, that 
she had been out to the place (on the Easton road) two days oefore, and 
seeing a hole in the vertical (newly dug down) side of the sawdust heap, 
had taken pains to investigate the matter. 
“We sat in the carriage,” she wrote, and watched the hole, and soon 
saw a swallow enter it and, immediately after, another. They came out, 
flew away, and returned, entering the hole again. Each time they went 
in little clouds of sawdust puffed out like smoke. I got out of the 
carriage and wdnt up the mound to the hole. I put my hand and arm in 
as far as I could, but it was not far enough to reach eggs or young, and I 
was afraid of the mound’s coming down upon me. After I returned to 
the carriage the birds came back, but were very shy of going into the 
disturbed hole, making several starts, vibrating their wings, then flying 
away. But in a few minutes they gained courage and again entered the 
hole. I think there is not the slightest doubt that it is their home. I 
could find no other hole, but have little question there were others which 
had been wrecked by the workmen, who had been digging down that side 
of the pile.” 
Some days later she wrote : “On Saturday we drove again by the saw- 
dust heap. There were full twenty holes, and apparently all were occu- 
pied ; swallows flying in and out all the time, a regular colony, just as 
you see them in a sand-bank. Poor simple creatures, I fear an earth- 
quake — or dustquake — has even now destroyed their work.” 
I begged her to make absolutely sure of the species, if she had not 
already done so, though really there could be no reasonable doubt upon 
that point, and on June 25 she replied : “Well, the species is all right. 
I verified things yesterday. We went out to the mill, and I went up the 
steep, sliding mass to the holes, 1 where the swallows dustward fly.’ 
About half a dozen of the holes had disappeared, but there were fourteen 
left. The birds, came about me, and I easily identified them as Bank 
Swallows, with white throat and a dark band across the breast.” 
Whether the breeding of Sand Martins in sawdust heaps has ever been 
recorded I do not know, but the occurrence seems to me of considerable 
interest, especially because the Sand Martin is the one member of its 
family, as seen in eastern North America, that I had supposed never to 
have altered its manner of life as a result of what we call civilization. — 
Bradford Torrey, Wellesley Hills, Mass. 
AU&, XX, Oct., 1903, p^ 3b 
