Barnswallows - Reflections on Parenting

Written jointly by Gay McDonnell Bumgarner (March 1983 outside Columbia MO on north Highway 63) and Sharon McDonnell (January 2011 cold New England Barn).

In a cold barn the photographer sits the dark, practicing quiet while also trying to stay warm and waiting to see something - anything - some kind of action besides the top of a black head high up in nest on the barn rafter. This action or change occurs in brief surprises in- between very long periods of no action

Barn swallows, Hirundo rustica, have thrived with the human race.  They once lived in caves but now there are barns and porches increasing in number. For some days the photographer has watched from a loft as the nest was recycled. It was cleaned and lined with new mud and some of the mother birds own feathers. Then eggs were laid, one each day and, glory be! none of the awful predators came.

Each day the watcher/waiter/photographer climbs into her place - and the two females sit in a cold barn, one on eggs and the other in hay,watching, dreaming, and incubating. The one on the nest has come to accept / tolerate the the other.