The House Martins Return

After two summers without a house martin nesting in Ormsaigbeg, it was wonderful this afternoon to stand outside The Ferry Stores and watch a pair flying up into the eaves to build their nest.  When we had the stores, several pairs used to arrive back from Africa each summer and,after we'd moved, we even had a pair which nested in a specially built box on the end of our new house.  Then they all disappeared.

The martins which belonged to other buildings in the area came back, though there seemed to be fewer, and this year we were worried when we saw very few around.  Usually they come after the sand martins but before the swallows, and the swallows have been here for several weeks.

Let's hope that this pair has a really good year so their offspring repopulate Ormsaigbeg.