Wednesday, April 16, 2014
They're back! Rocketing about like teenage hot-rodders, One can almost imagine the squeal and screech of tires as they stitch the meadow with their shenanigans. Zip! Zoom! Skimming the grass. Then, up, up, and away, pausing at the top of the sky, diving with the speed of a falling rock. Swish! Swish! Stop on a dime.
White-bellied. Backs of iridescent blue. Sleek as a bullet. All muscle and feather. As aerodynamic as a dart.
Tree swallows. Once upon a time they nested in trees. A century ago when Neltje Blanchan wrote her classic bird guides, she was already aware of the tree swallows' preference for ready-made habitations, that is to say, the bird boxes humans provided for martins, bluebirds and wrens. She foresaw the day when tree swallows no longer deserved their name.
That day has come. The tree swallows in the meadow have commandeered the bluebird boxes. When the bluebirds arrive soon they'll find the obstreperous squatters have taken over.
OK. We'll call them white-bellied swallows. And forgive their squatter ways because we love their high-jinks, their youthful devil-may-care carousing, their air-show acrobatics. Yes, we love the bluebirds too, but they'll have to hurry their spring migration, or stay the winter, if they want to find a place to nest.