Just Keep Swimming...

One of the advantages of having a daily or weekly routine is that you can become of aware of small changes in the local environment on a day to day basis, since you are familiar with the general environment. A recent example was when I crossed over a local bridge I cross over when walking a particular trail almost every day. While the pedestrian walkway is on the other side of the bridge, I often cross over to the other side to quickly look over into Alameda Creek from that side. This particular morning, I saw some motion on the water, so I raised my camera and looked through my telephoto lens to see more clearly what it was. Much to my surprise, it appeared to be a cliff swallow swimming in the water!

I have never seen any swallow spend any amount of time in the water; usually they are flying low over the water, looking for insects.

A closer look at the cliff swallow, especially the bill, seems to indicate that this is a young bird. Had it fallen out of a nest (usually built under the bridge)? While that was a possibility, I had noticed that by and large, the cliff swallows had largely left the bridge in the last week or so, which I assumed meant that all their offspring had fledged.

Another possibility was that, as a young bird, it had misjudged and while chasing an insect, had crashed into the water. Whatever the reason, it seemed that this bird was relatively relaxed and making good progress on the water.

Fortunately, after a couple of minutes, it made it to some water plants.

This photo shows the swallow's foot very clearly.

I am happy to report that the bird did make it to dry land. I don't have any photos of it at that point, as it was now under the bridge, and I was balanced rather precariously over the bridge railing and in danger of entering the water myself!

I've shared these photos with members of the local birding community and no one else has observed this before, so it is a pretty interesting, if rare, event.