The pearl-breasted swallow (''Hirundo dimidiata'') is a small swallow.

Description

The pearl-breasted swallow is 13–14 cm long. It has glossy blue upperparts and grey-white underparts. The upper wings, underwing flight feathers and forked tail are blackish-blue. The underwing coverts are a darker shade of grey-white. The lack of white in the tail is a distinction from similar '' Hirundo'' species. The outer feathers are slightly longer in the male than the female. Juveniles are duller and browner than the adult, with shorter outer tail feathers. The northern subspecies, ''H. d. marwitzi'' is darker and smaller than nominate ''H. d. dimidiata'', but the differences are small, and the species may be monotypic.

Distribution and habitat

The pearl-breasted swallow breeds in southern Africa from Angola, southern

Congo Congo or The Congo may refer to either of two countries that border the Congo River in central Africa: * Democratic Republic of the Congo, the larger country to the southeast, capital Kinshasa, formerly known as Zaire, sometimes referred to a ...

and Tanzania southwards. It is sparsely distributed, but can be locally common. It is partially migratory with many birds from the southwest of South Africa wintering further north. This is a bird of dry scrub, farmland and clearings. It is often found around human habitation.

Behaviour

The pearl-breasted swallow feeds mainly on flying insects, with a fast direct flight. The call is a chittering ''chip cheree chip chip''.

Breeding

It builds a bowl-shaped mud nest reinforced with grass or hair and with a soft lining. It sometimes uses old nests of the

greater striped swallow The greater striped swallow (''Cecropis cucullata'') is a large swallow that is native to Africa south of the equator. Taxonomy The greater striped swallow was described by the French polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in 1780 in h ...

, ''Cecropis cucullata''. The nest may be reused in later years, and one was utilised for 30 years. The nest is built in natural cavities or man-made structures such as buildings, culverts and shafts, but its preference for isolated and abandoned buildings means that this species has not benefited from artificial sites to the same extent as, for example, the greater or

lesser striped swallow The lesser striped swallow (''Cecropis abyssinica'') is a large swallow. It breeds in Sub-Saharan Africa from Sierra Leone and southern Sudan south into eastern South Africa. It is partially migratory with South African birds wintering further no ...

s. The two or three eggs are pure white, and are incubated by the female alone for 16–17 days to hatching. Both parents then feed the chicks. Fledging takes another 20–23 days, but the young birds will return to the nest to roost for a few days after the first flight.

Gallery

File:Hirundo dimidiata 1894.jpg, Illustration by R. B. Sharpe (1894)

References

* Sinclair, Hockey and Tarboton, ''SASOL Birds of Southern Africa'', * Turner and Rose, ''Swallows and Martins''

External links

* Pearl-breasted swallow
Species text in The Atlas of Southern African Birds
{{Taxonbar, from=Q767065

pearl-breasted swallow The pearl-breasted swallow (''Hirundo dimidiata'') is a small swallow. Description The pearl-breasted swallow is 13–14 cm long. It has glossy blue upperparts and grey-white underparts. The upper wings, underwing flight feathers and forked ...

Birds of Southern Africa