My touchstone of the seasons is the arrival and departure of the swallows. I welcome the swallows in spring and salute their departure in autumn. It’s an act rooted in ancient folk-lore and ritual, with the Roman natural philosopher Pliny the Elder writing in the First Century AD that farmers took their cue from the swallows on when to sow and when to reap
In my case, it is the first sight of the appropriately named welcome swallows in September and their departure in late February that tells me when to put away my winter clothes and, six months later, when to stock up on logs for the woodfire.
In the two decades since I made Hobart my home swallows have provided another dimension to the shape of the seasons. For the first time, I have lived near a swallow breeding territory and I have been able to monitor a family at work rearing young over the spring and summer months. I’ve felt a part of the family.
The swallows for years nested in the rafters of one of the BBQ huts in the Waterworks Reserve and a hand-painted sign urged people to “Please be kind” to the nesting swallows. The message worked except for one occasion when the nest was destroyed by vandals. The nest was soon rebuilt.
Visiting the site at least twice a week I established a connection with the swallow family, watching the nest renovated at first with mud drawn from a specific puddle containing mudstone, and then seeing the female incubating the eggs for long periods, her head just visible above the lip of the construction, especially so when she greeted her mate bringing food.
Then the first calls of the unseen young, the sight of them leaving the nest and, finally, watching the parents teach them to fly and hunt insects from a nearby perch.
Unfortunately, swallow watching took a backseat this year because the BBQ hut was removed in early 2021 to enable engineering works to strengthen the dam wall of the southern reservoir.
I think I shared the same disappointment as the swallows when on arrival from the mainland they found their breeding site gone. I was happy, however, to see young swallows in flight a little later in the breeding season. The swallows had found another nest site on a ledge of a pump-house tower rising above the water of the northern reservoir.
Although I missed out on the joy of seeing swallow young make their way out into the world, I still I felt like a proud grandparent when I eventually saw the young swooping and diving, hunting insects. And when I stopped seeing the swallows in late February, instead of my usual disappoint and sense of loss at their departure, I was content in the knowledge that a new generation would return in September.