Summary

This episode is all about birds in the family Hirundinidae. These are the swallows and martins.

Other than when they’re nesting, swallows are in the air almost all day long. This aerial lifestyle and that high-speed, erratic flight pattern can make it hard for us earthbound primates to get close looks at swallows.

But these flappy little birds definitely deserve our attention. They have many charms and talents that—with a little patience—we can learn about and see for ourselves.

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Research Citations

• Phylogeny and Evolution of Swallows (Hirundinidae) With a Transcriptomic Perspective on Seasonal Migration [PhD Dissertation]
• Phylogeny of swallows (Aves: Hirundinidae) estimated from nuclear and mitochondrial DNA sequences
• Convergent evolution in social swallows
• Correlated evolution of biparental incubation and sexual tail monomorphism in swallows and martins
• The Hawk-Eyed Songbird: Retinal Morphology, Eye Shape, and Visual Fields of an Aerial Insectivore [PDF]
• Evidence for multiple drivers of aerial insectivore declines in North America
• Flight Behavior of Individual Aerial Insectivores Revealed by Novel Altitudinal Dataloggers
• Variable facial plumage in juvenile Cliff Swallows: A potential offspring recognition cue?

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Photos of Some Species Mentioned

Attributions

• Purple Martin sounds (Xeno Canto recordings XC675813 and XC675814)
• Cliff Swallow sounds (Xeno Canto recording XC468935)
• Tree Swallow sounds (Xeno Canto recording XC600068)