Cliff Swallows Debating Nest Furnishings

While not the sharpest photos we've ever posted, we had to put these up because what happened made us both laugh out loud at the same time. It depends on which one of us tells the story as to who is the male and who is the female (we can't tell them apart.) Chris was watching with the bins and Mike had the camera. One bird is in the nest just sitting there with some white fluffy material for the nest. The other flies in and looks at the mate and the material. Then it takes it away from it. We both assumed it was just taking it to add to the nest, but without much hesitation, it dropped it right out. That's when we both laughed out loud and, of course, had our anthropomorphism moment talking about the interaction between the two. "No, honey, we won't be using that."

In our house, Chris has made all the design decisions since she got rid of the beer keg lamp Mike had in college, so that's why she assumes it's the female doing the discarding. Mike just thinks in the bird world, the males are dominant.