That dark, swooping shape in your yard may look like a bat,
but it might actually be a bird searching for insects. Some birds, like barn
and tree swallows, love bugs like mosquitoes.
Tired of being eaten alive in your own backyard? While citronella candles and insect repellent
can help a little, introducing natural insect eaters like birds is an even
easier way to clean up the insect issue.
Pest Patrol
There are many species of birds that eat insects;
some can eat as many as 1,000 bugs per
day! Different birds have appetites for
different bugs. For example, the Eastern
bluebird prefers grasshoppers, while the purple martin likes flying insects. The
downy woodpecker seeks out beetles and moths that live in trees, while the
chickadee eats larvae and caterpillars.
Since they are prevalent in the Northeast all summer, I'm
going to focus on barn and tree swallows.
They're important because their main diet is mosquitoes – a major pest
to people and a carrier of West
Nile virus and other
diseases.
 Barn Swallow
- Lives from Alaska to California,
Canada to north Florida
- Is six inches long with a
forked tail and rust-colored belly
- Nests and attacks
intruders as a colony
- Prefers to live in a barn
Tree Swallow
- Breeds in North America and winters south of Mexico and in the Caribbean
- Is five inches long with blue-green feathers, a
forked tail, and white belly
- Nests near water as a flock
- Will nest in natural or artificial cavities or
in bluebird boxes
 Behavior
Swallows are named because they catch bugs and eat them in
midair. The swooping acrobatics are quite entertaining to watch. The fact that they hunt as pairs or in a
group is quite interesting. No crashes
occur despite what looks like random (and even suicidal) swoops.
Interestingly, as I observed at the pond at my mother's
farm, these birds drink by flying low over water (like ponds) and scooping up
some water as they fly over. They also pick up insects that are hovering by the
water's surface.
 The Photos
All of the photos in this blog entry are of barn and tree
swallows on a farm in upstate N.Y. this spring. If you have a field near your
home, you can encourage swallows to move in next spring by placing bird boxes
in it. Then sit back and enjoy the show!
Resources:
http://duncraft.atom5.com/garden-pests-3312.html
http://www.pestproducts.com/swallows.htm#Barn
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_Swallow
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barn_Swallow
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Re: Think it’s a Bat? It Might be a Bird!
