Stuart MacKay wrote:

>I've seen the same thing as David Buckley. Barn swallows harassing a spotted
>sandpiper at Montlake. This was back in July.
>
>Is it possible there were recently fledged young around and the parents were
>being protective !!!

I wouldn't be surprised at that at all.

>Last Saturday I saw barn swallows apparently aerial feeding what was
>presumably a young bird. Two birds flew towards each other then climbed. At
>the top of their climb (about 15-20 feet) the "act" to place. Judging by the
>sound one bird made it was begging for food - is this normal. I would expect
>so ?

This does surprise me. I'm so used to thinking of swallows "parking" their
young in prominent places (dead branches, fence wires) and foraging out to
return to feed them again and again and again and again....well, you get
the point. A great place for a bird photographer to hang out is in one of
these parking lots. I don't think I've ever seen a young bird of any kind
being fed in flight.

Are you sure it wasn't a male and a female having a little late-season
tete-a-tete (or queue-a-queue)? :-)

Dennis Paulson, Director phone: (206) 756-3798
Slater Museum of Natural History fax: (206) 756-3352
University of Puget Sound e-mail: dpaulson at ups.edu
Tacoma, WA 98416