It was a beautiful day on the farm. I was all caught up on my mowing
and weed eating. Therefore, I figured I would take an opportunity to
hop aboard my big John Deere 5410 and drag my ten-foot rotary cutter to
the back pasture and knock down weeds.

The farm is a beehive of activity, as several good neighbors are
happily cutting, raking, and baling hay from many of my fields. I get a
clean pasture, and they get hundreds of rolls of hay for their winter
cattle feed. There are five tractors here right now, all hard at work.

These events always take place in the early summer and fall, and I
usually end up just Bushhogging whatever fields Rick and Harold avoid.
My back pasture is usually pretty weedy, so I always get to cut that
one. Only the best grass is rolled up for future consumption. Moo!

I greased up all the lube points on the rotary cutter, cranked up the
big green JD, and let her warm up a bit. It is mid-July, and the summer
heat and thick humidity is hanging in the air. You can actually see it.

I back out of the barn and start heading up the drive towards the house
and beyond, when to my surprise I notice a baby barn swallow
precariously perched on a hydraulic hose at the top of the front
loader. He is weaving back and forth and does not fly off despite the
loud noise and vibration.

I pull over by the house and my wife comes running from the front
porch. I call her “eagle-eye” because, although her eyesight is not the
best (she has worn glasses since early childhood), the woman can pick
up a piece of dirt on the living room carpet from any vantage point
inside the county, especially if it came in on MY shoe!

Mary had, indeed, noticed the little swallow on the tractor from the
time I came out of the barn, which is a good sixty yards from the
house. I shut off the big diesel engine and climbed down from the
royal, yellow seat, and both of us gazed up at the very scared, and
seemingly very disoriented, little bird.

Here in the holler that lies on the Monroe, Kentucky/Macon County,
Tennessee line, barn swallows are part of the landscape. At the end of
March one pair usually shows up first. They remind me of ancient wagon
train scouts checking out the lay of the land.

“Yep, this here is the place, all seems well. Fly back and tell the
others to come on down! Lots of places to nest and plenty of flying
bugs to eat. It’s going to be a great summer.”

All of a sudden there are six barn swallows, and soon ten or twelve. By
early April, there are twenty or thirty, making nests in the eaves of
the house and in the lean-tos – and are you ready? THE BARNS!

We can lie in our bedroom and look out the window and see at least
three nests close up. We have studied these magical little birds for
years, and it is always a blessing to be able to watch them fly, eat,
mate, lay eggs, and hatch babies, then to watch them grow and
eventually leave the nest. The process begins again, all summer long,
over and over until September, when there are over two hundred barn
swallows living here with Mary and me as their guests.

There are two electrical wires that run from a pole in the yard to the
house. (We are the last ones served on the Tri County Co-op line.) Each
night throughout the season, just before the birds are ready to assault
mosquitoes for their evening meal, they tend to line up on the wires,
making it easy for me to count them.

I want to interject a little vital info, at this point, for the birders
amongst my readers.

Barn Swallow
Hirundo rustica

The barn swallow, Hirundo rustica, is found throughout much of the
world and is resident on all the continents except Australia. It is
easily distinguished from other American swallows by its deeply forked
tail and rust colored under parts.

The barn swallow's aerial maneuvering is unexcelled. It can
effortlessly make sharp turns while flying at high speed, enabling it
to catch flies and other insects on the wing and in great numbers.
(They remind me of little stealth fighter jets. JSB)

When feeding young, the swallows fly from before dawn until after
sunset, while taking only infrequent rests. Barn swallows usually nest
in small colonies and also hunt together. When a cat or other predator
(OR SOMETIMES ME!! JSB) approaches their nesting site, the entire
colony immediately mob the intruder in an impressive display of aerial
acrobatics. Most of their hunting is done near ground level, over open
fields, and especially near water. However, often on late summer
afternoons, they can be seen hunting high in the air. They simply
follow the insects, which in turn may be reacting to differences in air
temperature.

As their name implies, barn swallows usually nest in barns and other
outbuildings, as well as under bridges and in culverts. A common
species in much of rural America, the barn swallow thrives on the
diversified farm.

It is generally held in high esteem by the old fashioned farmer,
perhaps because like the farmer, it works from dusk to dawn. And unlike
other birds, it chooses to live in a building. Also like the farm
family, the extended swallow family seems to work together. And of
course, farmers appreciate any bird that eats insects and doesn't eat
grain. Also, many old-fashioned farmers are romantics and enjoy
watching these beautiful flyers working above them.

Swallows will take advantage of any human activity that stirs up
insects, whether it is a single person walking through tall grass or a
huge, noisy machine harvesting wheat. They will flit back and forth
following a sickle bar mower cutting hay for hours. (This is very true.
I have almost been knocked off the tractor by a hungry barn swallow.
JSB)

But back to Barney..... of course, I named him. He would not fly from
the tractor so I gently placed my index finger under his belly just
above his feet as you would a pet parakeet, and he climbed on aboard.
How very sweet he was. I had unfortunately seen many of these little
guys who did not make it to full-fledged adulthood. I have seen them
fall out of nests and break their necks. I have seen their remains
after a lost battle with a snake. On a rare occasion, I have actually
seen little ones like Barney fall right out of the sky. Why, I am not
sure. A sickness, or a weakness, or just a scary moment? Mother nature
can be very scary and many of these baby creatures have a tough row to
hoe with the odds stacked against them.

I was worried about this little fellow. I thought his tail looked a
little funny. I had just seen the Disney/Pixar movie Finding Nemo and
thought about the little baby angelfish with the bad fin.

I placed Barney on a branch of a two-year-old tulip poplar and walked
away. He still looked petrified. I didn’t want to leave him there,
exposed, and Mary suggested that I take him back to the barn where his
home must be. Perhaps he will have a better chance there.

So I cupped the little fellow in my hands and walked back to the barn.
He didn’t want leave my hand so I petted his head and talked with him
for a while. Big recording star and author here talking softly to a
barn swallow. I felt like Snow White. I put him on a shelf of wood,
about five feet off the ground, and said goodbye to him.

I boarded the tractor and headed back to the weedy field, where I would
proceed to ride around in loud circles for about six hours. This is a
ten-hour field so I would not finish today, besides I have to leave to
tonight for a four-day trip. I thought of little Barney and hoped he
was doing okay.

I saw a Mommy Doe and her little fawn walking by the woods’ line. I
called Mary on my walkie-talkie, and she drove the truck back there to
see
them. She also brought me some much-needed water and a BLT sandwich on
toast,
with fresh homegrown tomatoes. Hey, now!

Watching the fawn reminded me to be vigilant, and I cut this field so
as not to run over any babies. I swear if I ever hit a fawn with this
tractor I would sell the farm.

My neighbor Harold told me a sweet story once about hitting a fawn and
taking it to a friend who was knowledgeable enough in these matters to
care for the little deer and nurse it back to health. Except for a lost
ear, the deer healed up pretty well. And after six months he let it go
back to the woods.

Well, it came to pass while my friend was deer hunting a few years
later (an interesting paradox, huh?), he had a big doe in his sights
and noticed the missing ear. Big, tough, farm boy broke down crying,
went home, and didn’t hunt any more that year.

I stopped the tractor well before entering the barn. It was about 7
p.m., and I looked all over for Barney. I took it as good news that he
wasn’t still there sitting on the wood. He wasn’t on the barn floor
anywhere either. After a while I pulled the tractor inside, shut her
down, and closed up the barn.

Around the end of September the barn swallows just disappear. All of a
sudden, they are just gone for good. I sadly take down the nests from
around the house and clean up the porch. Time to get ready for the
coming winter.

I always miss the diving, flying spectacles that play out in my front
yard every day. I kind of miss the constant chirping and early morning
squawking that commences in the feathered commune around 5 a.m.

I don’t know where they go. Probably Capistrano or someplace, but
wherever it is I hope Barney is with them. I hope that he has achieved
his colors and that he has learned to fly. I hope his tail is okay and
next March, when the cycle begins again, perhaps one of the many barn
swallows buzzing around my head next summer will be Barney.

Maybe he will know me. Maybe I’ll recognize his funny tail.

Maybe I have lost my ever-loving mind!

Fly on!