The Real Beauty of Tree Swallows

This morning Brad & I headed to our favourite location to photograph Tree Swallows, Neville's Pond located just inside Paradise offers a little haven for these beautiful little birds. Each spring dozens of these swallows come to Neville's Pond to nest in the boxes we have scattered both around & in the pond.  These fast flying little birds spent almost all of their time in flight and even when perched they don't seem to sit long. That is until they begin to nest.

Once the males arrive they begin to check out all the available nest boxes and quickly claim territory. Once a mate is found the pair quickly gets the process of nest building underway. During this time period the pair spend most of their time hanging out around the box guarding it from other swallows who are relentless in trying to take over the box in the early season.

It is then that we place interesting looking perches such as the ones in these photos for the birds to land on. Then its just a waiting game until you get one or both of them on the stick!

So far 6 nest boxes have swallows guarding them, plus one more pair right in my back yard. Over the next few weeks almost all of the boxes all have swallows occupying them. These photo opportunities will not last long because once the nest has been constructed the female will spend most of her time in the box incubating eggs while the male busily feeds her. Expect more posts to come of how the Tree Swallows are doing and of course more photos!

Below are a few more of my favourite images from our morning session

Notice the wings back on look like a butterfly, this is the first time I've noticed this

A short clip of one of the nesting pairs

Tree Swallows Return!

After a long winter, Tree Swallows are back for another nesting season. Only a few weeks ago the first swallow of the season was spotted and now this morning there was well over 20 of them fluttering around Neville's pond. This past weekend i repaired last years boxes and constructed a few more. I checked back this morning to see if the swallows were interested in the boxes yet.... I was not disappointed!

It won't be long now until they begin nest building. A pair of swallows has taken up territory in a box right in my back yard! This is the third year in a row.

After a very busy weekend repairing boxes and camping i hope to get some photos of Tree Swallows on interesting perches. I will try my luck this week and will be sure to post with the results. I now have 20 boxes at Neville's pond ready to go. The next location i will be placing boxes is a small wetland near my house where I've had a single pair of swallows using the same box since i placed it in 2011. This year id like to see more swallow boxes in the area to help reduce the number of swallows fighting over the single box.

A little surprise this morning was a Barn Swallow mixed in the the Tree Swallows.

Wilson's Snipe | A master of disguise

This morning i ended up sleeping in and not going shooting icebergs with Brad as i had planed on doing, but around 7:45am when i received a phone call from Brad saying he was photographing a Wilson's Snipe right next to my house i jumped out of bed and rushed down to the marsh!

Sure enough there it was, my arch nemesis bird. For quite some time we both have been trying to get some nice shots of a snipe calling from a perch but from what we have seen it appears the snipe will only call from a perch in the early morning usually in May & June. This is when they are claiming nesting territory and finding mates. Even though we didn't get the bird on a perch we were both happy with the images we came away with. Snipe are extremely secretive and usually the only time you get to seem them is when they flush up in your face as your walking through a wetland.

In the following weeks we are going to continue our efforts in getting an image of a snipe calling from a nice perch. This morning the first Tree Swallows of the season have been reported! I can't wait until they begin to nest in our boxes for another consecutive season. This afternoon my dad and i will continue to build more boxes. We encourage you to build a box yourself and place it in your yard. Swallows take readily to next boxes and are amazing to watch in your yard not to mention they eat flies! 

                                                        If you look closely you can see the Snipe's tongue

Wilson's Snipe calling

How you usually see snipe 

Below is a s photo of the stump we have placed in a local wetland for the snipe to call on. By doing this we hope to get a unique image in the sense that most images of snipe are of them calling from a fence post rather then natural logs or sticks

European birds continue to invade Newfoundland

Over the last few weeks a very rare event has taken place. N and NE winds have been blowing migrating shorebirds like European Golden Plover and Black-Tailed Godwits WAY of course and now they have some how found their way to the island of Newfoundland. These birds are strong fliers that can fly non stop for days on end. Unlike other birds they tend to migrate over the ocean rathern than land. Possibly making them more venerable to offsetting winds.

                                              Common Redshank!

The numbers of birds that have been found are staggering by any means. Almost 200 European Golden Plovers and multiple reports of Black Tailed Godwits really gets the blood pumping after a very LONG and dull winter here on the island. Yesterday I helped a birder from California find a group of 6 plovers that have been hanging out in a small field for about a week now. This small group of plovers are a lot more tame then any others that I know of. If you stay inside of your car and wait......and wait they will eventually work their way over to you. It worked out for us that the birds were drove towards us by a black dog that lives in the aera. It was amazing to see the birds crouch down and use their camouflage to stay hidden rather then fly away like most other shorebirds.

European Golden Plover

More euro birds like wheatear are still showing up, we all are waiting and searching for the next MEGA rarity like a Eurasian Curlew or Meadow pipit.

This weekend becides hunting for mega rarities Brad & I hope to get some nice stumps set up in a marsh close to my house in hopes of getting some snipe on them. Also it is crunch time for building Tree Swallow boxes. Spring is shaping up to be a VERY busy season!



UPDATE!

This was a prewritten post. This morning Bruce Mactavish discovered a COMMON REDSHANK at Renews Harbour !!!! Also Dave Brown found a Eurasian Whimbrel. As i write this local birders are trying to locate a possible Greenland subspecies of Dunlin!

How much longer will this continue!!!!
My e-mail is brendankelly00(at)hotmail.com if you need directions