. Birds of America;. Birds -- North America. 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
. Birds of America;. Birds -- North America. 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 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- frolls tachina) and the Mexican, or .SwainsonV, Cliff' Swallow (Pcti-dchclidan liniifrDiis iiirldiui- tjastra) are inhab
Size: 1869px × 1338px
Photo credit: © Library Book Collection / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookauthorpearsont, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1920, bookyear1923
