Happy Holidays from Alewive Farm! As winter gains a foothold, and the water buckets start to fill with ice overnight, we settle into a more reflective frame of mind--that's code for sitting near the wood stove with a warm drink and a good book :-) The ice skates are ready for the pond to freeze and the x-country skis are on the front porch waiting the first snow.
Wishing you all the very best for the holidays and Hope for the New Year!
The Barn Swallows arrive later than the Red-winged Blackbirds, and come swooping into the barn the first week of May. They quicky clean out one of the existing nests in the rafters and get to work. Their nests are made of mud and grass stalks. Once hatched the chicks will stay in the nest waiting for insects their parents bring to them in an endless stream from dawn until dusk. The barn comes to life with the new chicks eagerly chattering about the incoming meals.
It is truly amazing to watch the first flights--there is sometimes one chick that's the dawdler and needs to be coaxed out by parents. They will all gather exhausted after that first flight on a beam or piece of equipment. They will return to the nest for the next couple days, by that time, barely fitting in the cramped space. Within days, the chicks are performing the amazing acrobatics the adult birds do as they catch their meals in flight, intersecting flying insects around the pond and in the barn. Shortly after, they are off for the next week or two and will return periodically. Once in awhile, the parents will opt for a second brood, and I wonder what becomes of the first brood?
Each year, 6-10 pair of Red-winged Blackbirds return to our pond (or should I say we live on their pond?). These are the great grandchildren of birds that have been coming here, long before we lived here. This year it was March 2nd and the pond was still frozen and a snowstorm arrived a day or two after they landed to pick out their nesting spots among the cat tails. Before nesting, they spend their time in the pine trees or the maples, alert to all the movements around the farm. The call goes out when the cat leaves the house and becomes a collective network as long as he is out. The same is true when humans venture near the pond--the males leave the nest and head to a higher lookout and alert the others on the pond. It is always a delight when they arrive, because Spring is following them up from the Southern States where they spend the winter. And, it is always a sad day in late summer when I realize I no longer hear them and the last one leaves the pond.
