Dawson Trail Dispatch, written by Norm Gregoire, August 2024
Page 8 https://issuu.com/dispatch222/docs/dawson_trail_dispatch_august_2024
During the heat of the summer, a common pastime for community members looking to cool off is to take to the beautiful Roseau River that runs through the tall-grass prairie natural area. While gliding down the river on a canoe, raft, or tube, you’ll be rewarded with a diverse landscape and views of the wildlife that call the river home. One of the most impressive displays on the river is watching a colony of bank swallows as they tirelessly swoop in and out of their burrows. As a birding enthusiast, it is an event I marvel at every time I witness it.
The bank swallow is Manitoba’s smallest swallow, between the size of a sparrow and a robin. They have grey to brown upperparts (back and back of the head) and a more lightly coloured breast with an obvious dark collar. In flight, the bank swallow has a somewhat erratic flight pattern.
Bank swallows are often found near water sources such as rivers, marshes, or ponds, where they nest in cavities in the banks. In more recent times, they have been making use of man-made gravel piles or road cutoffs to nest in as well. The male will create the cavity by digging a hole using his beak, feet, and even wings. The females will watch the males hard at work and use this as an indicator of which male to breed with. Once a male and cavity are chosen, the female will construct the nest using various vegetative materials.
Bank swallow nest in colonies, and if you have been fortunate enough to see one, you would agree that they can be very impressive. Bank swallows will nest in groups of anywhere from ten individuals to many thousands! Watching these colonies is mesmerizing, as you see the swallows darting around in and out of the cavities, completing their daily routines.
Witnessing the natural phenomenon of a bank swallow colony is something that has become increasingly rare to see over the last half of a century. It is estimated that Canadian bank swallow populations have declined by as much as 98%! Although it is hard to pinpoint exact causes of the drastic decline, it is thought that threats such as habitat changes in nesting, migration, and overwintering sites have key influences on the health of the population.
The bank swallow will not disappear completely any time soon since they can be found on every continent except for Australia and Antarctica and have a population in the tens of millions; however, this is somewhat of a false comfort. I would hope that we have learned from the history of species such as the passenger pigeon that big changes can happen very quickly, and if the behaviours that are causing these changes do not get altered, then history will repeat itself. Through decades-long surveys, it is known that bank swallow populations are in steep decline, and it is up to us to aid in the recovery of this species at risk. I want to admire these charismatic birds as I drift down the Roseau River for many hot summer days to come.