The Wonders I See

Peggy Fasciani shares another bird-related insight, this one gained from John K. Terres

Another of Helen Manson Andrews’ favorite authors, John K. Terres, in his book The Wonders I See, wrote about the attachment birds have to their mating and nesting places.  I quote Mr. Terres:

I think that one of a friend’s most fascinating bird-banding projects was the testing of the homing instinct of a male rough-winged swallow.  John discovered a pair of these birds nesting in a 3-inch drainpipe in a concrete wall of a bridge that spanned a creek near his home.  The pair of adult birds were busy going in and out of the hole to feed the young ones in the nest.  On June 15, he caught the male in a net as it came out of the nesting hole.  He banded the swallow, got in his car and drove with it four miles away.  There he released it, then drove rapidly back to the nesting hole to watch.  It had been fifteen minutes since he had released the bird and dusk was settling down, when the male swallow came back and entered the nesting hole.

Three days later, he decided to give the bird an even greater test.  John had planned a birding trip to New Milford, Delaware.  He again caught the male swallow as it came out of the nest hole.  Enroute to New Milford, about thirty-two miles south of the swallow’s nesting place, he released it.  The time was about seven o’clock in the morning.  At seven o’clock in the evening, when John returned home, he discovered that the male swallow had returned to its nest hole.

I guess that proves my naivete when I trapped an English Sparrow (House Sparrow) who was sitting on a nest in one of my bluebird houses at Secor’s Farm on Robinson Lane, put the sparrow in my car, drove to Old Hopewell Road and released it.  I should have known that the sound it made as it flew from my hands was equivalent to a "bird laugh."  Even though the English Sparrow is not protected, I can’t bring myself to harm them - so what are we to do?  The pugnacious little buggers!

Wings Over Dutchess, February 2005

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