Garbage, Gas, & Bird Watching

The sewage lagoons at Ensley Bottoms in southwest Memphis are not only home to the City's Earth Complex and TVA's Allen Fossil Plant (where electricity is generated from coal and methane gas). They are also home to many rare birds. Even Audubon Magazine lists this area as a prime bird watching locale.

Here's our resident bird enthusiast/substation engineer's field report:

Barn Swallows
I went looking for other, more celebrated, birds until it occurred to me to write about the hundreds flying just overhead.


Barn Swallows are beautifully marked. Barnies use their forked tail to maneuver like a little fighter jet in search of bugs. They feed on insects in flight and can skim the surface of the water to get floating insects.

Barn swallows once built their nests in natural formations such as caves but now almost always attach their nests to man-made structures like overhangs, under bridges and even in barns.

They are clever in nest placement; notice how the nest cup is near the “roof” – this only allows a narrow slot for the parents to slip in and out. Both parents incubate during the day changing out every fifteen minutes. The female sits all night with the male taking a sleeping perch close to his family nest.



Barn swallows nest communally usually near water and can be seen in large groups getting mud a beak full at a time to form their nests. The male and females both work on a family nest together and it takes about a week to complete; this may take 1000 trips!