The winds were blowing hard at Huntley Meadows Park on Monday and I watched as a Tree Swallow (Tachycineta bicolor) struggled to stay on its perch high in a tree. The determined little bird kept changing wing positions in an effort to maintain stability.
Eventually, however, the swallow lost the battle and appeared to be blown off of its perch.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 
Great sequence Mike!
Thanks, Dan. Swallows are almost impossible to capture in flight, so this was the best I could do for action shots.
Birds are so well adapted to the air that I don’t think many people think about a bird losing a battle with the wind.
We had very strong winds last Sunday, and I watched grackles trying to hold on to marsh reeds in the same way. I failed to get any decent photos, so it’s a special treat to see yours.
The swallows are so light that they are buffeted pretty easily by the wind. Another swallow had to foresight to choose a lower perch and didn’t have quite the same problem.
Poor guy (or gal?)! 😦 But fantastic shots 🙂
Oh bless! What a lovely little swallow and a wonderful sequence of images 🙂
The answer my friend… 🙂
Maybe he was just playing. He looks like he was branch surfing in those first two shots.
I like you interpretation, Allen, that he might have been enjoying the wind and not fighting its effects.
Those are really sharp photos, for being shot in windy conditions. I get a lot of camera shake with the big telephoto on when it’s windy. Did you up your shutter speed to compensate?
I think that my shutter speed was up, Sue, because I was pointed up at the sky. Camera shake can be an issue sometimes with my big lens when I hold it up for too long, but I think my technique has improved and the image stabilization in the lens seems to work pretty well too.
This actually looks like a great “in-flight shot”!
I guess these qualify as “in-flight” shots, especially the ones in which the swallow has lost contact with the tree branches.