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In spring and fall many of our birds make long journeys under their own
power, some of the most publicized being the migration of the Arctic
tern, a bird that may spend the northern summer north of the Arctic
Circle and, before returning there next season, may have visited south
of the Antarctic Circle. The golden plover that makes a nonstop flight
to Hawaii is another famous traveler, and many of our smaller songbirds
are no mean travelers either. The barn swallow that nests about an
Illinois farm in the summer may spend the winter in Argentina. The tiny
hummingbirds' feat of crossing the Gulf of Mexico nonstop is worthy of
mention too. Such travels have become commonplace through familiarity.
We have come to accept even the possibility of occasional transatlantic
passages of small perching birds, helped by transatlantic vessels, and
of such birds as starlings, making their way from place to place by
boxcar.
But when it is time for birds to make their nests and rear their family
we expect them to give up their traveling for a time and to settle down
in one place. We expect, with our songbirds, to have the male arrive
first, pick out a territory, and announce to his species that other
males are to keep out and that a mate is welcome. The female arrives
and chooses her mate or territory, and a nesting ensues. Many species
defend the area around the nest against others of their kind. So it
comes as a surprise to find nests built in such a situation that they
are not stationary but move back and forth, along with part of their
environment.
BY BOAT Tree swallows nest on the ferryboats that ply between
Ogdensburg, New York, and Prescott, Ontario, across the St. Lawrence
River where it is more than a mile wide. The nests are tucked into
suitable openings on the ferries, and the frequent trips back and
forth across this mile of water and the docking at different piers do
not seem to disturb the birds. They gather their nesting material of
feathers and straws and leaves from either shore, and when the young
are being fed, insects may be gathered about the Canadian or the United
States shore, depending on where the ferryboat is docked.
Another example comes from Western Australia, also of a swallow, the
welcome swallow which is nearly like our barn swallow. A pair of these
birds nested on a boat used for visiting local coastal stations. If
there were eggs or young in the nest when the boat sailed, the old
birds would accompany it, once following her on a trip of thirty-five
miles and back.
BY TRAIN Barn swallows have been noted nesting on railway trains that
run across the two-mile portage between Atlin Lake and Lake Tagish in
British Columbia. In the summer the train makes the trip almost daily,
and for many years a pair, or a succession of pairs, has made its
nest and raised its young in one of the open baggage cars. Members of
the train crew took an interest in the birds and put up a cigar box
for a safe place for their nest. Here the family seemed to prosper,
undisturbed by the proximity of people and baggage and the clatter as
well as the movement of the train.