The Daily Telegraph

The first swallow springs eternal, if a little earlier…

- By Joe Shute

“Hirundo Domestica!!!” wrote the 18th century naturalist Gilbert White in his diaries, marking the first swallow of the year.

Similar exclamatio­n marks popped up in my own mind this week as I cycled to the top of a hill called Long Line in Sheffield during my allotted hour of daily exercise and watched a swallow swoop low over my head, its fork-shaped tail twitching behind.

I see the birds in this spot each summer – and how wonderfull­y reassuring that they have returned.

Though when they will appear is becoming harder to judge.

The first swallows of the year now arrive far earlier than in the 18th century, when sometimes it would take until June. White, along with other naturalist­s of the period, felt the idea of migration was a flight of fancy. More likely the birds were thought to hibernate underwater during winter or hunker down in chimney pots.

Studies by the likes of the British Trust for Ornitholog­y have found that these days swallows arrive from their African migration a full fortnight earlier than in the Sixties and are breeding 11 days earlier, too.

The birds have been spotted as early as February while there have been numerous reports of the swallows even overwinter­ing in the south of the country. In doing so they are answering the prayers of John Clare, the 19th century poet who longed for swallows to brighten up the darkest days “twittering as wont above the old fireside / and cheat the surly winter into spring”.

Our newly arrived swallows may be unimpresse­d with the weather this weekend – rather chilly compared with recent days and drizzly in parts of England and Wales. However, next week things will brighten up.

Some readers have contacted me to tell me of their first swallow sightings and do please email more. The birds are a welcome reminder for us all that it is not just viruses that speed across the world.

 ??  ?? A pony grazing at sunset after a warm and bright day in the New Forest in Hampshire
A pony grazing at sunset after a warm and bright day in the New Forest in Hampshire

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