great pictures and story

E X C E L L E N T

Very moving. Absolutely brilliant capture and documentary. My best wishes to you.

I also agree that this is the best picture of the series. Deserves a place on the Elves table for next POW

The photo is fine (perhaps a little dark), but it's the set -- with anthropomorphic narration -- that makes it powerful. It’s inspiration for thinking about photo presentations. Nice work.

Some nice storytelling. Feels almost like a sad fairy-tale for children. I am afraid though the story is much more prosaic than that. The swallows are in the middle of mating and, sadly, the female gets struck by a truck. The male, being in a certain state, referred to by some as "horny" and not realizing what has really happened to his girlfriend, keeps trying to proceed with his amorous sorties until our author decides to interfere and protect the poor feller from his own stupidity. It turns out, they, like us, sometimes don't let the right head think.

I must add that you have done an admirable job of photographing the poor things and an even better one of interpreting the event.

Speaking of Barn Swallows, they are the ones that got me hooked on birds. There are Barn Swallows all over the world.

Unique!

A story that makes me cry. :(

Thanks for the story. A sad but soul touching one.

very touching.........u just cant help but feel sorry for them......

Definitivamente unas tomas impresionantes y que nos cuestionan a los humanos para recuperar los sentimientos de solidaridad para nuestros semejantes gracias por compartir con nosotros esta historia.

A sequence & presentation that grabs deeply the soul

It is a very sad story, my wife and I cried a tear for this poor family of birds.

I've got a headache.

I'm no Ornithologist, but, while I agree the narrative is touching, it certainly appears to me that the living Swallow is copulating with his dead friend's corpse. I would be interested to hear a non-sentimental bird behaviourist write an evaluation of this scenario.

I once read an account by a scientist who witnessed one male duck chase another into a window. The pursuing duck then proceeded to copulate with the dead duck's corpse for six hours, providing fairly compelling evidence that ducks engage in homosexual necrophilia. Things are not always what they seem.

Well captured. This is what photography is all about, capturing moments in time.

I am very impressed with the photos I've seen here. Your documentary is very interesting and somewhat troubling as well. Regards, ~Sky

Sad...

It looks though like he is mating with her... :(...at least that's what it looks like when I see alive birds.

Sad story anyway and great pictures.

An ordinary enough looking pic. with an extra ordinary and very moving story. I love animals and are very moved by tragedies like these. I had seen a similar incidence a lot of years ago. A young dog whose mother died in an accident woudnt leave her body,nor did he allowed anyone else to pick it up (it was a local road of our area).He stayed with her body for atleast 2days/night before he was forced to move and the body was moved. If you look a little deeper into animal world, you will instantly realize that the bond between Mother and Child in animal world is equally strong as it is in Our world. Just thought of sharing my views/story with you guys.Thank you.

Naman

Excellent very impressive, unique. Comgrats !

they are Very beautiful and effective photo that i can not say anything about them.Regard hamed

Excellent story,great use of potography for documentation.Excellent Alex

I feel very sad about this story. The swallow has better heart than a human. We human-being are dried in the modern society.

These photos are really touching me.

this is so good! Sad thing to see, but so good captured! well done!

I am sure this is not the case of copulating az someone described the duck story - animals also have... let say soul, even if this is not the best and accurate word

Thank you for this pictorial docu-drama. Very Moving.

This is undoubtedly one of my favorite pics having seen it here for the third time. While I'm naturally inclined to cut the little guy some slack for just doing what nature hard-wired his limited faculties to do, if everyone else is going to anthropomorphize his behaviour then I'm going to join in the fun.

You sick over-sexed, perverted ball of feathers, stop humping your dead wife's corpse! What kind of demented avian freak would have sexual relations with someone while they are dying of internal injuries and continue to do so after they are dead. Sound stupid? No more so than the ridiculous sentimentality attributed to him above. Can't wait to see it again.

It's so impressional and you can enouncement your perception wonderfully. Oh, this shot in my country is so popular and some of people see this shot and so worried for these birds, this shot: http://gallery.photo.net/photo/2315348-lg.jpg

and beautiful.

Beautiful.

I'm going to pretend I never read some of the other posts about animal sexuality and instead stick my head in the sand and feel wondrous at the emotion a simple barn swallow displays for its' dead loved one. :)

sad, yet beautiful. thank you.

Jay,

photo.net = art, and as a result, sentimentality

after a truly intellectual and inspiring critique like yours, one would be inclined to think you perhaps belong on some other site, perhaps something related to sex deprivation and the sort. please, let someone point you in the right direction. away.

all the best.

Beautiful story...

Fantastic, need a heart of stone not to be moved.

Excellent shots. Picture sequence also narrates the events. The story touched my heart.

In that little body, too little heart filled with so much of love, affections! Amazing!!

-Christhu

Beautifully photographed, as was stated earlier, a true representation of what photography can really be. A heartbreaking story frozen in time for all. Wonderful.

A sad story....well told.

Good work.

This is such a sad story... Someone told me these photos are just photos of one bird killing another, shown in the wrong order and that birds don't have feelings, but that's such a stupid thing to say... I know birds have feelings, all animals do. It is so sad to see this bird mourning the other bird.

Hi Wilson,

I work as a picture researcher for Hello! Magazine and would like to publish this set of pictures. Can you pls email me at the following address: mramirez@hola.com as soon as you read this message.

Thanks and best regards,

Marián

!!!!!