Nature slipped a cog when she gave BANK SWALLOWS the tunneling instinct and forgot to add the proper tools. Their feet are just as poorly developed as in other members of the family who build regulation homes. They are just as apt to excavate their two or three foot-long orifices in a hard clay bank as in a sawdust heap — it is merely a matter of proximity. Perhaps the old dame intended them to select soft material and only variants tackle the tougher medium. They are sociable and usually a number nest together. I have seen the seaward side of sand dunes so honeycombed by their nesting entrances that they looked as tho a gigantic shotgun had peppered the surface.
North America from northern British provinces southward.