Swallows in Hail Storms (1 Viewer)

[i321587]

Having seen my first swallow of the year earlier today I'm now sitting here with a heavy hail storm outside. How do swallows, martins and swifts deal with really heavy hailstones? Do they just live with it, fly to an area outside the storm or fly above the clouds to escape? Thoughts would be welcome.

Tony

 

[Bird_Bill]

Interesting question Tony. Have some anecdotal experience. Hope everyone and thing is safe of course. Have read that birds and many animals can detect the drop in barometeric pressure that accompanies a storm. Will move out ahead of it. Others, such as woodpeckers will try to find a cavity in a tree to ride it out. Assuming swallows & swifts be of former group and fly towards a safe haven or away from danger as it were. Have directly experienced 4 tornados in my life, an EF1, an EF2, and 2-EF4. Each was preceeded by prolific hail. Only once out of 4 was during daylight and I do recall swifts seeming to fill the air shortly afterwards. Most noticable were bats. Read of the eyes of hurricanes becoming veritable "bird cages" as high pressure, low wind speeds contained maybe signals that conditions are better within. As compared to low pressure and high, sustained wind speeds outside.

 

[MJB]

Having seen my first swallow of the year earlier today I'm now sitting here with a heavy hail storm outside. How do swallows, martins and swifts deal with really heavy hailstones? Do they just live with it, fly to an area outside the storm or fly above the clouds to escape? Thoughts would be welcome. Tony

Bird Bill has covered the subject pretty comprehensively. On a related aspect, when hirundines are exposed to lengthy periods when their insect prey remain inactive, ie in cold weather, they themselves will minimise their energy loss by becoming torpid after settling to roost.

They recover when the temperatures rise and insects are again on the wing, but the mortality risk rises, and for several reasons. They may just die because the cold spell is too long to survive, they may, if they are not under any shelter, become drenched if rain is prolonged and so cannot generate enough warmth to survive, or they may become prey to raptors or mammals.

I've seen Barn Swallows in this torpid state on isolated rocks in a shallow valley in Brandenburg near the Polish border. I'm sure I could have picked them up, but I just took some pictures at the time. Interestingly, all the birds had settled on the sunlight-aspect of the rocks, even though it was low cloud overcast, but not raining. The birds were still there when I left the valley two hours later, but had gone the next day when it was sunny, if still coolish.
MJB