This is Bird Note.

Has a barn swallow started slapping mud on the wall of your house in preparation for

making a nest?

Are you dreading the cleanup duties that will follow?

If so, the chattering of this swallow probably is not music to your ears.

Over the years, barn swallows have adapted to nesting near people and often build their

mud nests in barns or garages and on protected ledges.

They seem to particularly favor ledges right above a front door.

The welcome mat below becomes a pile of unwanted calling cards.

But a barn swallow nest above the door is also a sign of good luck.

How could that be?

Simple!

Barn swallows love the insects that we humans consider pesky, especially mosquitoes,

nats and flying termites.

A single barn swallow can consume 60 insects per hour or a whopping 850 per day.

That's 25,000 fewer insects per month that might have joined your summer barbecue.

During the hundreds of thousands of barn swallows all over the country, well, that's roughly

a bazillion bugs that aren't bothering us humans.

Maybe now the chatter of the barn swallow is a more pleasing sound.

For Bird Note, I'm Mary McCann.