Jim’s Blog

The barn swallows are still working on building their nest; well one of them is. While the one is busy building the nest the other seems to be on lookout for danger, so he can signal the other to get out of there if trouble arrives. Their nest building schedule is: 2-5 min. working on the nest, then about 25 min. away. I find it interesting that they don’t spend the night here. They leave just before sundown and come back in the morning.

Since they are not using the original nesting perch I built, I took it down and replaced it with a shelf consisting of two pieces of 1×4 which you can see below.

I thought I would provide them some food. While I was at Walmart the other day I saw this small bag of canary and finch seed fortified with vitamins and minerals. I purchase it and sprinkled it on the shelf. I saw one of the swallows pecking at the seed, so I guess, the seed is OK for them.

The round item next to the bird seed in the photo is a bottle cap containing crushed chicken egg shells. I read that the crushed shells would be good to provide to the swallows. But, when I placed the cap with shells on the shelf, the swallows seemed to be afraid of it, so I took it down.

Another day in the swallows nest building. They seem to be getting use to me being around. Today I was able to get closer to them without them flying away. Because they let me get closer, I was able to get the best photos of them so far.

Female on Nest

Female and Male

Well the swallow couple who was here yesterday, is back today busy building their nest in the cup type nest that I put up. In doing more research, I found that all the swallows need is ledge to build their nest on. It may be too late for this season, but I plan on putting up a series of ledges for other swallows to use in the future.

 

Another pair of barn swallows is checking out the nests I built. This pair has spent more time here looking things over than other birds. This is the first time I’ve seen any birds checking out the cup nest I made out of hardware cloth and sheetrock compound.

Three years ago, I planted some catnip next to the patio out back. I’ve let it go to seed every year, and just before the growing season begins (the end of Feb or early Mar) I mow it all down to get rid of the dead twigs sticking up. Over this past weekend we got an inch of rain. Now the catnip growth is really taking off.

 

 

I’m seeing a few swallows every day swoop in under my overhang over the back patio. Still none have fancied my perch/nests enough to take up residence. I’m thinking now that I may need just some plain shelves up near the ceiling of the overhang for the swallows to build nests on. That will be my next project.

Well, the swallows didn’t return today. So, maybe they don’t believe my first attempt at building a nesting perch is secure enough. In researching last night I came across this site. On this site I learned that swallows prefer a cup type nest with the top of the cup approximately 1 1/2 inches from a ceiling, I guess to keep bigger predator birds out of the nest.

So I set to work today to build a cup type nest. I had some scrap plywood. I went to the local Home Depot and got some hardware cloth to build the framework of the cup. Then using some sheetrock mud that I had on hand, I completed the nesting cup.

A couple of swallows arrived today and scoped out the nesting perch. They came three times (that I saw). Each time they spent more time looking over the nesting perch. I was excited; even more so, our cats were excited to see the birds through the window.

 
In trying to get barn swallows to nest under the eaves, I learned from my daughter Lauren that the swallows need a source for mud to build their nest. Of course one of the ingredients is water. I found and purchased a birdbath today at the local Walmart to provide a source of water for the birds.

 

 

I put the swallow nesting perch under the eave of the house on March 20th. Today, April 11th, the first swallows arrived looking around. As you can see below, a got a photo of a swallow on top of the perch. Whether the swallows will return to build a nest is another story. We’ll just have to wait and see.