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Sand Martin | Riparia riparia
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The Bank Swallow is the smallest swallow seen regularly in the Caribbean. North American breeders cross the islands in autumn and spring on their way to and from their wintering grounds in South America, often together with Barn Swallows, resting on wires and bare branches near water. The American and Eurasian populations (Sand Martin) are treated as one species.
Voice
A dry, rasping trrrt or brrrt, merging into a continuous twitter in flocks. Migrants are mostly quiet in the region.
Recording: Esperanza Poveda — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · shortened to the first 60 s, mono · xeno-canto
Identification
12–13 cm, small and compact, with a short, slightly notched tail. Upperparts are plain grey-brown, the underparts white, with a sharply defined brown breast band that often extends down in the centre. The white throat curls up as a half collar behind the ear-coverts. The underwing is dark. Juveniles have pale buff fringes to the feathers of the upperparts and wing-coverts. The flight is fluttering and somewhat erratic, with fast wingbeats.
Confusion species
Northern Rough-winged Swallow Stelgidopteryx serripennis is larger and more uniformly brown, with a dingy grey-brown throat and breast and no defined band. Juvenile Tree Swallows Tachycineta bicolor are grey-brown above and show at most a faint, broken breast band; they are larger and broader-winged. Southern Rough-winged Swallow Stelgidopteryx ruficollis on Trinidad has a rufous throat and a pale rump.
Habitat
On passage it hunts low over freshwater marshes, ponds, rice fields, salt pans, rivers and open grassland, also along the coast. It feeds on flying insects and rests on wires, fences and bare branches, often with other swallows. It breeds in colonies in burrows dug into steep sand or earth banks; it does not breed in the Caribbean.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation types of the Caribbean.
Range and movements
A fairly scarce passage migrant on most islands: the Bahamas, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, Jamaica, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, the Lesser Antilles, the ABC Islands, San Andrés and Trinidad and Tobago. There are scattered winter records. It breeds across much of North America, Europe and Asia; American birds winter in South America.
- Resident
- Summer visitor (c. Oct–Mar)
- Winter visitor (c. Apr–Sep)
- Passage (Mar–Apr, Oct–Nov)
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
The best chance is in September and October at freshwater marshes, rice fields and salt pans where flocks of Barn Swallows feed. Among swallows resting on wires it stands out by its small size, grey-brown upperparts and crisp breast band.
Conservation status
Not threatened. Numerous worldwide, although North American numbers have fallen sharply since the 1970s, partly through the loss of steep river banks.
Scientific name
Riparia riparia | (Linnaeus, 1758)
Linnaeus described the species in 1758 as Hirundo riparia; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Riparia was introduced in 1817 by Forster. Riparia comes from Latin riparius 'of the riverbank', from ripa 'riverbank', after the nest burrows these martins dig in steep banks. The specific name repeats the genus name. The specimen the first description was based on came from Sweden.