This post isn't really about swallows at all.

Wood ants descending rapidly en masse from a Quercus ilex on Montseny at the onset of a sharp shower:

Having spent several decades standing under trees waiting for the rain to stop, it is my firm belief that small ants do not flee from the rain as do big ones, although their level of activity also increases both prior to and during a shower. Perhaps big ones are on a guilt trip: “an investigator at A.T.&T. Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, N.J., estimates that most of the acid in rain falling over certain remote areas of the world [including Murray Hill?] may come from ants.” The superb article on Wikipedia unfortunately doesn’t cover Met Ant.

Ukrainians, on the other hand… Here are two Ukrainians drinking contentedly in the rain on Carmelo hill behind Park Güell in Barcelona, with the Sant Pere Martir memorial telecom masts far right and the Garraf massif in the background:

A couple enjoying a bit of overgrowth in the undergrowth on the other side of the same hill, surprised by the rain, flee NAKED to a nearby tree–Adam & Eve, ants in their pants:

Swallows have better things to do at such moments, or so they would have you believe:

Tags: picture, walking, walking tours
Categories: Birds, Drink, Les bourgeois, Man and monsters, Small creatures

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1. Tom
   May 23rd 2008 10:46

   Looks like a swift to me.

2. Trevor ap Simon
   May 24th 2008 10:14

   I’m pretty sure it’s not a bat.