As my husband and I move into our house in rural west central Wisconsin, I notice them right away. Two dozen adult barn swallows, flying in and out of our pole barn, soaring out over the field, creating a chattering cacophony.
"Do you think we have enough barn swallows?" I ask my husband.
"Probably more than enough," he replies, "but that's okay. They'll eat their weight in flies and mosquitoes."
For the rest of the summer, the chattering barn swallows provide background accompaniment as we build a fence and fix the barn so we can move our two horses from the southern part of the state.
And then one day as autumn approaches, we bring the horses home. And at about that time, the swallows leave abruptly. They have raised their offspring, and it is time for the barn swallows to go where it is warmer. Without all the twittering and chattering, overnight the barn turns into a quiet shell, hushed and still.
The following spring, I wait and wait for the barn swallows to return.
And finally one May afternoon, they do return, chasing away any lingering remains of winter's stillness as they search for insects and check to see how their nests fared over winter.
As the sun sets, the swallows settle into the barn for the night, roosting on the rafters. They reproach me with an animated, melodious scolding when I come into the barn to feed the horses.
"Hey," I tell them, "this is MY barn. I can come in here if I want."
The swallows sit in the rafters then, watching me, discussing among themselves - it seems - the activities of the humans and the horses, and how different the barn is now from the previous four or five years when it was unoccupied by anyone but themselves.
I've always thought barn swallows are handsome birds - such a striking cobalt blue, a rosy-orange tinge to their breasts, the long forked tails.
When I was a kid growing up on our family farm only a half mile from where I live now, nesting barn swallows were a special event. Many farmers, I know, think of barn swallows as noisy, messy intruders who must be chased away. The farmers knock down the nests over and over, until the barn swallows become so frustrated they go elsewhere.
But not my father. He liked the swallows, and he always allowed them to build nests over the light fixtures in our dairy barn.
I was usually in the barn with Dad at milking time, so I had many opportunities to observe the barn swallows.
At first when the female swallow was incubating her eggs, all I could see was her head as she hunkered down in the nest, day after day. Then when the eggs hatched, I watched her fly busily in and out of the barn as she gathered food for her babies.
"Watch this," Dad said one evening after a mother swallow had flown out of the barn. He pulled out his pocket pliers and stretched up as far as his five-foot-ten- inch frame allowed, holding the plier handle over the nest.
The baby swallows, who were invisible prior to this, didn't know the difference between their mother and the plier handle. In an instant, what had appeared to be an empty nest was filled with frantic hatchlings, obediently stretching their necks and opening their beaks, anticipating a morsel of food. When Dad pulled the plier handle away, they disappeared back into the nest again. Any time I asked him to, Dad would reach up with pliers so I could see the young swallows.
Gradually, the baby swallows grew bigger until they were packed tightly into their nest, a row of sleek heads with bright black eyes. Dad didn't have to hold up the pliers anymore so we could see the babies.
"They'll fly pretty soon now," Dad said. So, we kept an eye on them during milking. And not just once, but many times as I was growing up, Dad and I were fortunate enough to watch baby swallows as they took their first flight.
It was amazing. They'd pop out of the nest and fly - as if they'd been doing it all along. Small-scale versions of the adults, growing quickly day by day, soaring back and forth over the barnyard until - in a few weeks - it became impossible to tell the children from their parents.
Unfortunately, the rafters in our pole barn are much too high for me to reach up with a pliers so I can watch the babies open their beaks. But I am able to observe the adult swallows feeding their young. And who knows? Perhaps I will be lucky enough to see some of them fly for the first time.
My father died in 1992, but he'd be pleased - I think - to know I still watch the barn swallows - to know that I welcome them in my barn just as he did so many years ago.