Here are 2 photos featuring 3 of the swallows mentioned below. See if you can ID them (Answer at end of article)
Photos courtesy Sharon Milligan - Sharon's photos are available at the Pascagoula River Audubon Centre. For previous articles click on the blue title
With only six members of the swallow family on tap in Mississippi, the learning of them should go down like a spoonful of sugar. But I'm always surprised at the decided lack of interest in these aerodynamic creatures, as evidenced by classes, elderhostels, and various touring birders, from whom swallows get short shrift, if any shrift at all.
There is no better season than spring for swallow-watching. For one thing, all of the swallows are present, and all of them are in definitive plumages, which takes any guesswork out of the drill.
Let's review them according to their status in Mississippi, and then we'll do our best to help the reader meet the challenges in identifying them.
We put the Purple Martin first because it comes first on the local check list. The Purple Martin is a summer resident -- it arrives here from late January onward, and is unlikely to be seen, under routine weather conditions, after early September. As befits a national treasure, it nests in the finest digs that money can buy, but it also uses cracks and crevices in rocks and trees. Two of the most unusual nesting sites I ever found were in a woodpile on the ground, and in a dish-shaped antenna at least 200 feet above eye-level. Martins nest in most of the U.S. and in parts of Canada.
The Tree Swallow is a winter resident (some Purple Martin fans cannot be persuaded that a January swallow is much more likely to be a Tree Swallow than a season-rushing martin). Tree Swallows are present in winter in huge numbers; they often feed in the air (and over the marshes, and even on wax myrtle berries) in great flocks. The record here is something like half-a-million birds in one location in late December. They occupy the feeding niches left after the other five species of swallows have gone south for the winter and breed colonially throughout North America except in the southernmost tier of states.
The Northern Rough-winged Swallow is a summer resident, but in rather small numbers. It arrives early to mid-March and is decidedly rare after mid-October. It burrows its nests in dirt banks with steep faces near water and may also use culverts, drainpipes and occasionally a tree cavity. It pairs off in nesting season and becomes social during fall migration, when we see it in the biggest numbers.
The Bank Swallow is a transient species, migrating through our area in spring and fall. It nests in large colonies, excavating burrows in steep river banks, gravel pits, and highway cuts, from the northern two-thirds of the U.S. north into the Yukon and the Northwest Territories. It is fairly common between early April and late May, and again in August and September.
The Cliff Swallow gets the prize for the broadest distribution. An uncommon (Editor's note 2016 - now locally common) summer resident here, it is found north to Alaska and arctic Canada; it plasters its gourd-shaped mud nests against any vertical surface available -- buildings, bridges, cliffs. We look for it between mid-March and mid-October.
The Barn Swallow is an abundant summer resident over most of North America, including the Coast where it nests in a bowl-like nest of mud placed against a vertical surface but often needing some slight support from below. It's a fool for barns and outbuildings, but bridges are becoming a very popular alternative. A Barn Swallow before early March or after early November is a rarity.
One can learn the swallows by the divide and conquer method. The Purple Martin is larger, by more then an inch, than the Tree Swallow -- female and immature martins, with their light undersides, seem to be frequently confused with Tree Swallows. Note that the Tree Swallow is glossy green/blue above, and very white below. No other eastern swallow is as cleanly white below.
In spring, the Northern Rough-winged and Bank swallows need only be separated from each other. Both are brownish above and white below. However, the Bank Swallow is strictly white below, with a definite breast-band. Note that the Rough-winged, by contrast, could use a soaking in bleach. It is dirty white, and its throat and neck areas look to be in need of scrubbing.
The Cliff Swallow and the Barn Swallow are more colorful than other eastern swallows. Both have dark bluish-black backs. Note that Barn Swallows range from mostly white to mostly light cinnamon below -- but all have a markedly forked tail. The Cliff Swallow has color confined to the throat and upper breast, a squarish tail and a light rump patch, and is easily separated from the Barn Swallow.
I have always found the above noted differences to be of greatest help to me in the identification of swallows. There are other differences, in size, flight styles, etc., that become apparent the more one looks at them.
Getting six species in the same area at the same time is not as difficult as it seems -- you have from now until mid-May. Look for them over water -- quiet ponds, sewage lagoons, lakes, even the Mississippi Sound, and over open fields, especially when there is water nearby.
One can watch them coming and going, high and low, from above and below. Watch swallows long enough, and with enough attention to the differences mentioned above, and there identification is in the bag. You'll feel better. Trust me.
Birds in photos 1) Cliff swallow 2) Barn swallows and tree swallow.
Not to muddy the waters, another swallow, the cave swallow, is seen very occasionally in Mississippi (considered rare) but by all means learn this species from your field guide because, in birding.. you never know!
This article was published in April 1994
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