SWALLOW: snatching insects inches away from a jagged roof

QUICKER and sleeker than the vast majority of birds, swallows are a harder target than most for any hungry hawk to try to bring down. Breathtaking in their high-speed pursuit of insects, swallows are perfectly adapted to life in the fast lane and outflying a marauding raptor is more of a possibility than for less athletic species.

In addition, swallows boast incredible stamina and will trek thousands of miles each year on migrations back and forth to Africa.

They can be spotted arriving in this country anytime between March and May and will generally stick around until October, sometimes even as late as November.

It seems amazing that year after year they can still find their way back to the same nest site in a disused British barn or outbuilding, some having set off from the southernmost regions of Africa and triumphing over a host of hazards en route.

The nest itself is a concoction of mud, grass, and anything else that be moulded into a small cup shape and stuck beneath a roof or ledge.

Up to five white, speckled eggs are laid with the fledglings needing to learn their parents' flight skills promptly.

Sitting on an open branch or telephone wire, waiting to be fed, swallow youngsters are as vulnerable as any others to passing predators.

Once on the wing, however, it's a very different matter and most native birds of prey can be out-jinked and out-paced.

However, another African visitor to our shores, the hobby, preys with great success on young swallows.

In fact, this small, ferocious falcon specialises in feeding on them and their cousins, the house martins and swifts.

Adult birds are, of course, a tougher proposition.

From the tip of his small, streamlined head to the end of his long V-shaped tail feathers, the bigger male swallow measures about 20cm.

He's also the more handsome of the sexes with a vivid red forehead and red throat complementing the glossy blue feathers above and pinky white feathers below.

I've watched swallows twice in recent months and marvelled at their sheer manoeuvreability as well as their speed.

The first time I took special note was in a large field close to a local river. There, a solitary male was ignoring a group of slightly dumpier house martins, picking off the choicest insects for himself as he powered from one end of the field to the other like a SAM missile.

Later, during a visit to a farm, I noticed another male swallow tearing in and out of the courtyard, snatching insects perilously close to a jagged barn roof.

A few starlings nearby seemed positively clumsy in comparison.

So mercurial and silky are the swallow's flight skills that it is perhaps not surprising some mention of them has crept into poetry down the ages. Alfred, Lord Tennyson was keen on using swallows in his work, with one love poem including the line:"O Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying South, Fly to her and fall upon her gilded eaves, And tell her, tell her, what I tell to thee."

I'm sure a duck carrying such a message would not have produced the same romantic effect.

Then again, I suppose it depends on the woman.