(_Petrochelidon lunifrons_) Swallow family
_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
wing-spread.
_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.