Swallows 2017

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biggs682

Touch it up and ride it
Location
Northamptonshire
[QUOTE 4847190, member: 9609"]we think the eggs hatched on Wednesday which would have meant she had incubated the for 14 or 15 days, which is very quick, I guess this vey warm weather has helped.

Here they are 3 days old. One parent tending to them and the other briefly comes in at 1:30 with food.

[/QUOTE]

wicked video well done @User9609
 

oldwheels

Legendary Member
Location
Isle of Mull
Where I live all the old buildings like disused barns , garages etc have been bought up by developerrs and turned into fancy houses. Result is no more swallows. We used to have well over a dozen over and around our garden but none for about 3 years now as no nest sites nearby anymore.
 

Lullabelle

Banana
Location
Midlands UK
[QUOTE 4847190, member: 9609"]we think the eggs hatched on Wednesday which would have meant she had incubated the for 14 or 15 days, which is very quick, I guess this vey warm weather has helped.

Here they are 3 days old. One parent tending to them and the other briefly comes in at 1:30 with food.

[/QUOTE]

:wub:
 

Cheddar George

oober member
Ours had a second brood which is good as we are down to one nesting pair this year.

I would love to take photos but it is extremely dark up in the apex where they nest.
 

nickyboy

Norven Mankey
[QUOTE 4954889, member: 9609"]The ones I photographed - both the young fledged, they seemed to hang around the garage for a few days like they normally do then headed off with the parents. I think the parents returned a few weeks later and started to build another nest against the one in the pictures but they never completed.

We also had a pair nesting in the loft space above the garage, I think they just had the one brood of four (one was lost on its first day out)

A poor year for me really with Swallows, I think we have only had 5 young fully fledged. (I think our record year was 24)

They are still coming in and out of the garage and some are overnighting in there, but it won't be long until they are gone. Still plenty about generally but over the next few weeks the numbers will rapidly decrease.[/QUOTE]

Breeding success varies wildly, particularly for birds dependent on insect food as I'm sure you know. I follow a nest box scheme for Pied Flycatchers (which as their name suggest, rely heavily on insects). If the weather is warm and dry in the fledging period, they produce loads. However, if it's wet and cold often all the chicks die and the sum total of all the nestboxes is nil
 

raleighnut

Legendary Member
[QUOTE 5258860, member: 9609"]No, we have one overnighting in the garage but it needs a mate. Really disappointing this year, this is the first time in 18 years that we have not had at least two nests underway in the garage by the end of May. I'm just not seeing many Swallows about anywhere, in fact many of the sub Saharan migrants are just not arriving here in the nrmal numbers at all, Very few House or Sand Martins, only seen one Wheatear and I have not seen a Willow Warbler so far this year, on a positive note I am seeing usual amounts of Swifts and our Ospreys are back and doing well..

I'm wondering if they have had some sort of disaster down in Africa, it does happen from time to time, but its very worrying though, I hope its not climate change, that is happening and will have a huge impact at some point in the future just hope it is not having an impact at such an early stage., we really are making one hell of a mess of our planet.[/QUOTE]
We've got a few Swallows/Swifts (too high up to tell which) feeding around us but you're right about the damage being done to the environment.

Our 'bit' for conservation is the Ivy up the side of the house which is home to around 40 Sparrows.
 

annedonnelly

Girl from the North Country
There was a piece on the radio last week. Concerns about all the swallows, swifts & martins. They hadn't (by last week) arrived back in this country in any sort of numbers. The RSPB guy interviewed said they hoped they were in France/Spain waiting for the wind direction to change to help them head north.

I've only seen a handful of swallows, one house martin and no swifts yet.
 
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