Swallow war & love

Tree Swallows are here in good numbers. They are waging war over nesting sites with one another and with flickers. In the midst of the battles, some seem to have taken a break to mate.

That Tree Swallows are fleet of wing is an understatement. Often this aerial speed and agility is devoted to hawking insects. On this occasion, it was devoted to conflict and love.

The term, acrobatic, is sometimes used to describe the manoeuvres of Tree Swallows, but acrobatic falls short of capturing the rapidity and agility of their flight.

Males are the first to arrive from migration. In this encounter it almost looks as if the female (left) is denouncing the male (right) for not already having secured her a nesting cavity. Or they may be fighting for the same spot.

The object of much of the combat was a group of pilings in which flickers had carved cavities. There is a cavity in this piling that the Tree Swallows have used other years, but must fight for again. 

The fight isn’t just between various swallows. Here, a male swallow is making one of many challenges to a female Northern Flicker. She is looking out of the coveted nesting cavity, that, after all, had been carved by a flicker. The following morning, the flicker was still ensconced in the cavity.

In the midst of all the fighting, one couple chose to make love (the upper bird is the male). After recording this, I wondered, do Tree Swallows really mate during flight? A Web search of “Tree Swallows mating” only revealed shots where the female was perched—but then, perched mating would be a vastly easier picture to take.