I enjoy watching the barn swallows gliding with the ease and grace of Olympic figure skaters through our rural Waconia yard and listening to their musical chattering.
They are here to feed on Minnesota's flying insects from mid-April into September, and then it's back to South America. Like other swallows, they migrate by day, often feeding on insects as they travel.
The barn swallow nests all across Eurasia and much of North America, and is our most familiar swallow. It is the only swallow with a deeply-forked tail. They are dark blue-black on top, with a rusty throat and buff or pale rusty underparts.
A nesting bird throughout Minnesota, the barn swallow is least numerous in heavily wooded areas and most common in farm (and formerly prairie) areas. Originally they nested on the rocky faces of cliffs and in caves. But this species has long since abandoned natural nest sites in favor of docks, bridges, and barns. Outbuildings with wide-open doors and windows, through which the swallows can come and go at their pleasure, and the eaves of buildings are good spots for the half-cup-shaped nest. They are built of mud pellets, reinforced with grass, and lined with feathers and fine grasses.
Nature writers and naturalists Art and Barb Straub of Le Sueur watched a pair of barn swallows last weekend complete a nest of mud pellets in about eight hours and then bring feathers to line the nest. Nests are usually fastened against an upright surface. Both sexes incubate eggs and care for the young. Two broods can be raised each spring into summer.
Other things of note:
- Northern Lights azaleas have come into bloom. Now is the time to plant watermelon, squash, pumpkin, and muskmelon seeds in gardens.
- More monarch butterflies are arriving, and milkweeds are up several inches.
- Now, during the bloom of the common purple lilac, mushroom hunters are out gathering common morels.
- There is heavy shade in southern Minnesota deciduous forests where wild geranium and columbine are blooming and red-eyed vireos call. In the northern part of the state, moose calves are being born, quaking aspens and paper birches are leafing-out, spring-beauty and marsh marigolds are bloom, and white-throated sparrows and veeries are vocal.
Jim Gilbert has taught and worked as a naturalist for more than 50 years.
