Called also: EAVE SWALLOW; CRESCENT SWALLOW; ROCKY MOUNTAIN
SWALLOW
Length -- 6 inches. A trifle smaller than the English sparrow.
Apparently considerably larger because of its wide wingspread.
Male and Female -- Steel-blue above, shading to blue-black on
crown of head and on wings and tail. A brownish-gray ring
around the neck. Beneath dusty white, with rufous tint.
Crescent-like frontlet. Chin, throat, sides of head, and tail
coverts rufous.
Range -- North and South America. Winters in the tropics.
Migrations -- Early April. Late September. Summer resident.
Not quite so brilliantly colored as the barn swallow, nor with tail so deeply
forked, and consequently without so much grace in flying, and with a squeak
rather than the really musical twitter of the gayer bird, the cliff swallow
may be positively identified by the rufous feathers of its tail coverts, but
more definitely by its crescent-shaped frontlet shining like a new moon; hence
its specific Latin name from luna = moon, and frons = front.
Such great numbers of these swallows have been seen in the far West that the
name of Rocky Mountain swallows is sometimes given to them; though however
rare they may have been in 1824, when DeWitt Clinton thought he "discovered"
them near Lake Champlain, they are now common enough in all parts of the
United States.
In the West this swallow is wholly a cliff-dweller, but it has learned to
modify its home in different localities. As usually seen, it is gourd-shaped,
opened at the top, built entirely of mud pellets ("bricks without straw"),
softly lined with feathers and wisps of grass, and attached by the larger part
to a projecting cliff or eave.
Like all the swallows, this bird lives in colonies, and the clay-colored nests
beneath the eaves of barns are often so close together that a group of them
resembles nothing so much as a gigantic wasp's nest. It is said that when
swallows pair they are mated for life; but, then, more is said about swallows
than the most tireless bird-lover could substantiate. The tradition that
swallows fly low when it is going to rain may be easily credited, because the
air before a storm is usually too heavy with moisture for the winged insects,
upon which the swallows feed, to fly high.