SWALLOWS: LESSER CLIFF SWALLOW 
465 
they can not fasten their nests to a smooth painted surface, rough 
board or cement surfaces should be provided under the eaves of barns. 
At Lake Burford, where Doctor Wetmore found the Cliff Swallows 
nesting under cliffs, he watched the skilled masons coming to the 
shore of the lake for building mud. Their method of “procuring 
material for their adobe structures” has been delightfully described by 
Olive Thorne Miller in Upon the Tree-Tops, where she says—“It 
was when a recent shower had left little puddles in the clay road . . . 
most daintily they alighted on their tiny feet around the edge, holding 
up their tails like wrens lest they should soil a feather of their plumage, 
and raising both wings over their backs like butterflies, fluttering them 
all the time as if to keep their balance and partly hold them up from 
the ground—a lovely sight” (1897, p. 32). 
LESSER CLIFF SWALLOW: Petrochelidon Slbifrons tachina Oberholser 
Description.— Male: Length (skins) 4.I-4.8 inches, wing 4-4.1, tail 1.7-1.8, 
bill .3, tarsus .4-.5. Female: Length (skins) 4.8 inches, wing 4.1, tail 1.9, bill .3, 
tarsus .4. Similar to the Cliff Swallow but decidedly smaller, the forehead ochraceous 
instead of cream-color. 
Range. —Southeastern New Mexico and central-southern Texas, south through 
Rio Grande Valley and eastern Mexico at least as far as Vera Cruz; winter home 
unknown; migrates through Costa Rica and Panama. 
State Records. —The form of the Cliff Swallow breeding in the lower Rio Grande 
Valley in Texas and in eastern Mexico has been separated under the name tachina. 
It is an abundant breeder along the lower Rio Grande of Texas, and extends its 
range at least to southeastern New Mexico, where specimens were collected June 19, 
1913, at 6,800 feet on the Penasco River, near Mayhill, from a colony of about 500 
nests (Ligon). It breeds abundantly at Carlsbad (Bailey), and the breeding range 
is undoubtedly continuous from the Penasco down the Pecos to the Rio Grande. 
It was found by Bailey “common all along the Pecos Valley from Roswell to Carlsbad, 
and around the Capitan Mountains. It was breeding on suitable cliffs and under 
the eaves of buildings in the towns.” There was a bunch of nests under a low 
limestone cliff near Portales, June, 1899 (MS). At Carlsbad, August, 1910, Dear¬ 
born found it common and “breeding under the arches of the flume where it crosses 
the Pecos River” (MS).—W. W. Cooke. 
MEXICAN CLIFF SWALLOW: Petrochelidon albifrons melanogastra (Swainson) 
Description. —Male: Length (skins) 4.4-5.6 inches, wing 4-4.2, tail 1.7-2, bill 
.2-.3, tarsus .4-5. Female: Length (skins) 4.7 inches, wing 4.1, tail 1.8-1.9, bill .3, 
tarsus .5. Like the Cliff Swallow but “smaller, with forehead chestnut like throat, 
and side of head (rarely fawn*colored) and rump deep cinnamon” (Ridgway). 
Range. —Breeds in southern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico south over 
Mexican tableland to Guatemala; winter home unknown. 
State Records. —The form of the Cliff Swallow breeding in southwestern New 
Mexico is the same as that in southern Arizona and southward, which has been 
separated under the name of the Mexican Cliff Swallow. It is a common breeder 
at Mesilla Park (Merrill). Tt ranges at least as far north as Palomas Springs, in the 
Rio Grande Valley (one was taken May 9, 1913, at about 4,300 feet) and at least 
6,600 feet in the Gila Valley on the East Gila River. [Great numbers nest in cliffs 
