64. Dawn song flights of tree swallows.
7. When to Sing, and How
Songs and calls in flight
From page 133 in the book.
Dawn song flights of tree swallows. To hear the tree swallows in dawn song, head out well before sunrise to where you know they are nesting in the bird houses someone has erected, perhaps in an open field or above a marsh or wetland. With the show beginning so early, in the dark, you have no hope of initially seeing the bird in action, but hear him you do. Try to follow one individual throughout the entire dawn effort—-perhaps his songs are distinctive, different from those of other nearby airborne swallows. Document the best you can what he does. By now, you have a pretty good idea of the numbers you might collect to describe his behavior: number of songs per minute, and how that changes over time; his flight path, the circuit he takes around his nest box; how often he does this or that . . .