Kitchen Garden Forum

For the first time since we moved here we had a pair of swallows nest in our barn. They had a brood of 4-5 chicks but something dislodged the nest and we found only one youngster surviving which thankfully fledged the day after. They then set to and built another nest and this time there were 3 possibly 4 chicks hatched. Then disaster struck again! We heard a commotion and saw a number of swallows flying around frantically. We have no idea what the culprit was, but we found the nest on the ground and next to it, two dead chicks - one had been decapitated . Also a bit later on we noticed that, in the panic, what turned out to be one of the pair had flown into the window and had been killed Such a shame for them to have gone to all that effort for nothing. Let us hope for better luck next year.

On a much happier note our neighbour has a pair that are just starting their third brood of the year having successfully raised at least 8 chicks. I have attached a beautiful photo that she took of the first brood earlier this year.

Sorry to hear that your swallows have had such a difficult year but what an amazing photo from your neighbours nest.

How sad after all their efforts, could it be magpies? I read where someone who had suffered the same problem did the following. They waited until swallows had built their nest the following year then boxed it off with rigid wire mesh with holes big enough to allow the swallows through but stopped Magpies and Crows. They kept the wire approx a foot from the nest and said the swallows had no problems entering and exiting.

Thanks for that idea NB, will give it a try if any come back next year. We do have a number of magpies and it would deter any predators of the furry kind too! As our next door neighbour has a lot of cats we can't rule them out as they could quite easily scale the barn timbers.

Diane.

It's always sad when things don't go well - four of our seven blue tit chicks died in the nest.