October, 2026

The barn swallow is an interesting little bird, and I know there’s quite a few people out there that have been dive bombed by one when walking too close to one of their nests.  One of the apartments I used to live at had a nest right by the doorway, and they swooped down by my head to greet me each morning. 

There are a lot of facts about these little birds, and one interesting thing is that they can eat up to 850 bugs a day, and average about sixty insects an hour.  Which almost makes up for the greetings in the morning.

Another interesting thing is that they rarely stop flying to hydrate or bathe.  They fly low to the water and dip their bellies and beaks and fly away.  If you’ve seen them fly over lakes and other types of water, that makes a lot of sense.  Close to the water there’s a lot of insects to eat, and water, in a sense, acts as a napkin after they’re done with a meal.  Smaller birds are generally eaten by larger birds, and the apartment complex removed the nests and put up an owl decoy.  Depending on the decoy, this might be a viable solution, but they came back.  When I moved out the barn swallows were still there, and giving the neighbors a real phobia of birds.