At 11:20 AM 8/9/96 PDT, you wrote:
>
>Tuesday, August 7, my wife and I saw the aftermath of a striking mass
>mortality of Bank Swallows in eastern Washington. The locality was along
>Danekas Rd adjacent to the northeast corner of Sprague Lake, just west of
>Sprague, Lincoln County. Bank Swallows are common in this area, lining
>power lines in large numbers. But in one spot, on a section of the paved
>road about 100 feet long, there were an estimated 200 dead Bank Swallows on
>the pavement, in both lanes of the road but not on the shoulders. No dead
>birds at all were seen outside this very localized area.
>
>With the bodies confined to the pavement, I have to assume that the
>mortalities were caused by cars. But why this one very localized spot, and
>why such large numbers of dead birds?

I have witnessed similar situations to this one in southern Ontario at about
this same time of year. I watched Bank Swallows in very large numbers
gathering on hydro wires in a large open area (few trees). The birds were
in large numbers because they were preparing to migrate and there were many
juveniles present. I watched for some time, and every year this would
happen, the birds would swoop low over the nearby road and frequently,
nearly the entire flock would alight in the middle of the road (and often
the same section of road). Because this was an open area, straight
roads.... cars would speed by and kill many of the swallows. I would
suspect that you have discovered a similar phenomenon whereby many birds
were killed by one or a few passing vehicles and for some reason, that was
the preferred section of the road that the swallows 'chose' to rest upon.

Cheers,

Don Cecile
dcecile at cln.etc.bc.ca
Cheers,

Don Cecile
dcecile at UVic.CA or dcecile at cln.etc.bc.ca