![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/cliff-swallow-3794-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"cliff-swallow-3794-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nCliff Swallows are highly belligerent and pugnacious toward others of their own kind, especially when gathering nesting material but almost any time will do.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
During nesting season I often see large numbers of Cliff Swallows at mudholes gathering mud for nest building but three days ago in the mountains I witnessed a slight variation of the behavior. Instead of gathering mud they were gathering dried grass for their nest linings. There were many dozens of swallows landing in a small patch of dried grass, choosing and picking up pieces of it, and then flying off to their nests.<\/p>\n
Typical of Cliff Swallows at mudholes most swallows were raising and fluttering their wings for most of the time they were on the ground as other swallows buzzed all around them before swooping in to do the same thing.<\/p>\n
Out of the several hundred photos I took the photo above is one of the very few showing a swallow whose wings aren’t raised and fluttering.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/cliff-swallow-3844-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"cliff-swallow-3844-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\n
This posture is much more typical of the swallows I photographed that morning.<\/p>\n
It’s thought to be a defensive posture used by both sexes and meant to prevent extra-pair copulations (EPCs). At almost any opportunity males try to copulate with swallows other than their own mates and those sexually aggressive males often mistake other males for females. So swallows on the ground, both males and females, typically raise and flutter their wings in an effort to prevent those unwelcome matings while their gathering behavior makes them more vulnerable.<\/p>\n
As a result, vicious fights often break out. On this morning I didn’t photograph any fights because I thought I was too close to keep multiple birds in the frame but fights were certainly happening. In hindsight I think it was a mistake to not at least attempt to photograph fighting swallows.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/cliff-swallow-3908-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"cliff-swallow-3908-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\n
This bird stayed on the ground for an unusually long time as it was gathering grass and its wings were raised and fluttering defensively for almost the entire time. There were so many swallows buzzing around very close to the ground I found it difficult to get photos that didn’t include their shadows. Notice the shadow of another bird on the right side of the frame.<\/p>\n
This swallow probably spent more time watching for other aggressive birds than it did gathering grass. Here it had a small bit of nesting material in its bill but eventually…<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/cliff-swallow-3921-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"cliff-swallow-3921-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\n
it found a safe opportunity to pick up more grass before it flew off toward its nest.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/cliff-swallow-3925-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"cliff-swallow-3925-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\n
Sometimes they’d raise and flutter only one wing but the intention of the posture was still obvious.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/cliff-swallows-3954-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"cliff-swallows-3954-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\n
One last photo showing the defensive posture and the shadow of the bird it was directed toward.<\/p>\n
I should make it clear that females are sometimes receptive to EPCs and sometimes they aren’t but males always try to reject them. The fights break out whenever the attempted EPCs are unwelcome.<\/p>\n
Ron<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Note: <\/em><\/p>\n If you’re interested in knowing more about EPCs in Cliff Swallows here’s part of what Cornell’s Birds of the World has to say about them.<\/em><\/p>\n “Common at mud holes where birds collect mud for nest-building. Also occurs when birds go to the ground to gather grass for nest lining. Both males resident at a colony and nonresident males engage in extra-pair copulations (EPCs) with females. Females sometimes resist, and other times accept EPCs. The number of EPCs per female increases with the size of the mud-gathering group and in larger colonies. When gathering mud, both sexes flutter wings above their back, possibly to prevent being attacked by males seeking EPCs. Other EPCs occur at the colony when a male intrudes into a neighboring nest and forcibly copulates with the female nest-owner. The success of EPCs in leading to fertilizations is unknown, but allozyme exclusion analyses showed that collectively up to 43% of nests in Nebraska contained 1 or more nestlings not related to either the father (EPC) or the mother or both (intraspecific brood parasitism).<\/em><\/p>\n A study in Pennsylvania suggested that 13% of nests had extra-pair young and that 5.6% of the total offspring resulted from EPCs. Perhaps as a result of increased rates of EPCs that lead to more intrapair copulations and sperm competition in larger colonies, testis volume increases with colony size. EPCs may be a strategy perpetrated especially by inferior males, because those males had a probability of annual survival about 33% lower than that of males not engaging in EPCs “<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Cliff Swallows are highly belligerent and pugnacious toward others of their own kind, especially when gathering nesting material but almost any time will do.<\/p>\n