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The barn swallow will mob intruders such as cats or accipiters that venture too close to their nest, often flying very close to the threat. [60] Adult barn swallows have few predators, but some are taken by accipiters, falcons, and owls. Brood parasitism by cowbirds in North America or cuckoos in Eurasia is rare. [6] [37]
The chimney swift generally flies quite high, though it descends during cold or rainy weather. [49] When feeding, it regularly occurs in small groups, and sometimes hunts with swallows, particularly barn swallows and purple martins; [21] in mixed-species flocks, it is typically among the lower fliers. [31]
The barn swallow and house martin hunt for airborne insects in a manner similar to that of the slightly larger swift, and occasionally mixed groups of the species form. The most noticeable differences between the three types are: The shrill screaming call of the swift distinguishes itself from the more inconspicuous babbling of the swallow.
An artificial purple martin nesting colony The barn swallow is the national bird of Estonia. [48] They also are one of the most depicted birds on postage stamps around the world. [49] [50] [51] Swallows coexist well with humans because of their beneficial role as insect eaters, and some species have readily adapted to nesting in and around ...
The wire-tailed swallow is a member of the genus Hirundo, a cosmopolitan group of "barn swallows". It has two subspecies: [5] H. s. smithii was first described by William Elford Leach and K. D. Koenig in 1818. [6] Known as the African wire-tailed swallow, it is found throughout Africa. [5] H. s. filifera was first described by Stephens in 1826. [6]
The western house martin flies with a wing beat averaging 5.3 beats per second, which is faster than the wing beat of 4.4 beats per second for the barn swallow, [12] but the flight speed of 11 m/s (36 ft/s) is typical for hirundines. [13] The western house martin is a noisy species, especially at its breeding colonies.
The northern rough-winged swallow usually nests by itself, [5] although sometimes it is found in loose groups, often at the edge of bank swallow colonies, [6] of up to 25 pairs. [5] The nests are found in burrows located in soil banks, [12] very occasionally caves and trees, and in human-made cavities such as gutters and tubes. These burrows ...
The wasps, bees, and ants together make up the suborder (and clade) Apocrita, characterized by a constriction between the first and second abdominal segments called a wasp-waist , also involving the fusion of the first abdominal segment to the thorax. Also, the larvae of all Apocrita lack legs, prolegs, or ocelli.