Barn Swallow

The barn swallow is a small, fast-flying songbird with one of the widest natural breeding distributions of any bird species, nesting across much of the Northern Hemisphere and migrating to spend the winter in South America, Africa, southern Asia and Australia. It has glossy blue-black upperparts, a rusty throat and forehead, and a deeply forked tail, and it is a highly aerial feeder, catching flying insects on the wing with remarkable agility, often skimming low over fields, water and open ground. True to its name, the species readily nests in and around human structures, building open cup nests of mud pellets mixed with grass on beams, ledges and under eaves of barns and other buildings, a habit that has made it one of the most familiar birds associated with rural life across much of its range. Barn swallows are strongly migratory, undertaking journeys of many thousands of kilometres between breeding and wintering grounds twice a year. The species remains common and widespread overall, though some regional populations have declined with the loss of traditional farm buildings and changes in insect abundance.