Monday, August 21, 2006

Swallow watch


The swallows are starting to clump up on the wires. I counted thirty four this morning on the wires outside our bedroom window. I love their happy chatter. The swallows will line up in bigger and bigger groups and then one morning we will notice that the swallows just aren't around anymore. It's always sad when the swallows go.

There are two nests full of swallow chicks that are yet to fledge. One in each roof peak here at Whitelees. The chicks are noisy and hungry. Judging by the activity of the busy swallow parents, the chicks will be fledging just in time to make the grand migration.

There were a couple of moths at the back door this morning. I don't know what they are because I can't find my stooopid field guide. They were pretty good though. There were two of these. This guy was above the back door. I didn't realize that there was a hint of green in the wings until I enlarged the photo.

4 comments:

T said...

Feels like the Swallows, Martins and Swifts only arrived a month ago! Swifts have already departed and it won't be long before the others follow.

We had lots of House Martins this evening - many looking for places to nest next year. Couldn't count them, but I'd estimated about 30 above the house and garden. Hope we get nests next year!

Xtreme English said...

i've said it before...;you're very zen, sweetheart. "be here now...." I've been thinking about what I miss living in the city, but I realize it's just me that's missing. we're having a mouse crisis in our building. the young people are affronted by having MICE! and after the last big hoorah, when we had an exterminator person come and stuff all the holes in our floors and walls with steel wool, the mice seem to have returned. (as if they'd ever left.) i'd love to see a real mouse, actually. it's been three years since all the crows along rock creek died, and i haven't gotten over it. maybe that's why i don't look too closely at what's sharing my universe these days other than the centipedes swishing around the baseboards. (I'm happy to see them because they eat the bad bugs.) People were hysterical a few years back over the threat of West Nile Virus, but they were not paying attention to anyone but themselves. The BIRDS were dying, but who cared about that?

(and WOT is the purpose of those scrambled letters below here? is blogging forbidden to anyone who doesn't know our alphabet??)

J-Funk said...

I took a picture of a moth once. It was on the door of a potty at a campground we were staying at. It had been there several days, and people were whispering about what kind of beautiful moth had come by, and then I took a picture of it and it got upset and flew away. I should have turned off the flash. And the picture didn't even turn out anyway, it was blurred.

This scrambled alphabet thing is to block automated spammers. They're very persistant.

Peggy said...

Bless you Dean! I was hoping you'd know.