Looking for Cliffs under the AZ Falls

It had been a few weeks since visiting my cozy little work patch, so this past week I returned with a specific goal in mind. Having scoped out most of the likely species for this little site, last time here I made specific and successful efforts for Red-naped Sapsucker. This time around I was pursuing a more mobile quarry. I had a single Cliff Swallow back in February, flying around where the canal falls drop down several dozen feet to continue on their westward course. This was a very early sighting for Swallows, and I didn't see that bird upon further visits but it keyed me in to the possibility that in a month or two, they might take up nesting under the Arizona Falls Bridge. Cliff Swallows nest colonially under bridges near water, and are in that sense predictable to find. However, these elevated colonies and the subsequent shade that comes with them means that photographing these birds satisfactorily is a challenge.

Best of all, trying to find the Cliff Swallows at AZ Falls would let me revisit my favorite sign/water fountain placement situation maybe ever.

All of the winterfowl, even the Ring-necked Ducks, in this strip of water are gone, but Cormorant numbers were up. They're mostly Neotropics, but Rhinoceros Cormorant (front) and Headless Cormorant (back) also turn up this time of year. 

The main advantage vis-a-vis Swallowing is that the AZ Falls has a walkway and adjacent slope right next to the elevated plane at which the Swallows are building their muddy manors. This means that without rope ladders or cherry-picker trucks, eye-level viewing is somewhat possible.

With a small amount of trepidation and a certain amount of balance and control, positioning oneself on the dirt and cement slope seen on the left of the picture above allows for fantastic, eye-level views of the busy birds, even if the problem of photographing in the shade can't entirely be avoided.

And as for the Swallows themselves...they couldn't care less. Joggers and cyclists are often passing by on the walkway above their nesting site, and my increased attention did not deter them in any way. Clinging to vertical walls and building a house entirely out of mud and spit requires plenty of concentration, and worrying about the clearly out-of-its-element biped nearby is not high on their priority list.

It was a real treat to watch them working up close. One Swallow would often stay in the nest, molding  the inside no doubt and handling the decoration.  It would then emerge, apparently, to give direction to its partner, who would make the frequent trips down to collect more mud. Have we not all experienced this dynamic, in some sense or another, on a moving day?

And as a further point of relating and sympathizing, Swallows seem to lose patience too during these onerous exercises. Or maybe Cliffs just have a grumpier disposition than cavity-nesting Violet Greens, who find most of their domestic organizing done for them.  

It is interesting also to observe these groups of swallows and compare them to other colony birds. European Starling flocks and Blackbirds fly together and seem similarly sociable, but with the impressive Starling flocks, a sort of a common collective mind seems to pervade the group's movements (even though this likely isn't the case, they just operate, necessarily, under stricter rules that come with being in a larger group). With the gregarious Cliff Swallows, the community is central to everything the birds do--there are seldom any outliers or loners, any separate nests or pariahs. These Swallows are even known to move their eggs from one nest to another if a clutch fails or its own nest is deemed inadequate. 

Swallow crushing is not the easiest of pursuits, but if you can't bring Mohammed to the mountain...then find a way to get up the side of the mountain, lean over some railing, get a bit dusty, and take a few pictures. Everybody's happy.

That's Hard to Swallow

Recently I was scouring the eastern reaches of Tempe Town lake, along the McClintock Bridge, for Clark's Grebe and Common Loon. This isn't the best place to look for these birds, but the better-viewing pedestrian bride farther west limits your photographic range, and the McClintock bridge presents the rarer possibility of better photos. At any rate, the waterfowl were a no-shows anyway, but there was something very intriguing going on along the northern shore. 

Hundreds of Cliff Swallows were creating a commotion, a disturbance in the force, amidst the putrid muck on the water's edge. I hate to admit it, but it took me a minute to figure out why this big rotating system of birds touching down and lifting off after apparently getting a drink was necessary. 

Surely, ariel aces like them could swoop to drink cleaner water away from the stagnant muck?

Of course, the stagnant muck was the whole point. They were gathering material for their nests, impressive adobe things they build on the underside of bridges, cliffs, and any other shady overhangs that meet their territorial requirements. At some of the larger, more accommodating locations, these gregarious birds will nest in groups several hundred strong. 

The way they'd touch down and keep their wings raised, even while fluttering and collecting goop, reminded me of butterflies, but the way they flew certainly did not. 

 

 There seemed to be various levels of completion among the little gourds, and various levels of work ethic too. Some Swallows were more casual than others, at least in the building process. The concentrated activity also generated lots of bird droppings, and these were happily gobbled up by the insouciant Carp down below, the ultimate unscrupulous fish.

Despite there being plenty of muddy shoreline, even shaded shoreline, the mass of birds seemed interested in gathering from only one relatively small patch. As such, they had to harvest in shifts, and there was a constant revolving motion around the little mud farm. 

The grounded birds take a mouthful and lift off; new birds take their place and begin to gather.

They then bring the mud up to their nest, sometimes to construct of their own design and energy, and other times to merely drop off the raw materials for a waiting mate in the semi-finished structure. This dynamic was very curious.
Presumably all the birds building nests already had mates? Were some building homes with an eye for snagging a mate with their bodacious pad? Were some Swallow families just having two working parents? Interesting stuff...

At any rate, this high-stress, fast-paced cycle was more fun to observe and photograph than distant, blurry waterfowl. Even though I still have no photos of Loon species, this was a pretty good way to wind down the afternoon. Good riddance to those Loons. 

For these nest-builders, the big rule is, Don't Swallow!