These Swallows Fill Homeowners With Dread : Wildlife: Some Silver Lake residents see the invasion of the nest-building birds as a nightmare of spring that arrives under the protection of U. S. law.

Robert does not want to disclose his full identity, and perhaps it is a prudent decision. He does not want the animal rights people to find out what he has been up to, let alone the federal agents.

But the cliff swallows know who Robert is. He is the guy with the garden hose.

To them, Robert is a terrorist. When the swallows try to build their mud nests beneath the eaves of his Silver Lake home, as they are doing now, Robert goes on the attack.

“They’re pests. That’s exactly how I see them,” Robert told a visitor. Then he added: “You were smart not to park in front of the house. That’s prime bombing territory.”

Like the storied swallows of San Juan Capistrano, the cliff swallows have returned to Silver Lake--not that anybody is writing songs about it. To the contrary, the migratory birds that seem so charming and romantic at the mission at San Juan Capistrano are not held in such high esteem where Kenilworth Avenue and Hawick Street meet just west of the Silver Lake Reservoir.

The Audubon Society loves the swallows, and federal law protects them. But to a few neighbors here, the swallows are like relatives who cannot take a hint and keep coming back to visit year after year.

“They’re a pain in the ass,” grumbled Roy Holcomb, his home decorated with at least 32 swallow abodes constructed of hardened mud. Neighbors complain, but at age 82, Holcomb cannot do much but gaze out a guano-stained picture window and be philosophical.

“If my arthritis was better, I might try to prevent them from nesting,” he said. “But I let ‘em alone. . . . They’re life. Let ‘em live.”

Holcomb has lived here 15 years, and to him it seems like the swallows have returned every spring. Ernie Foster, who has lived at the corner for 40 years, figures they first started showing up 10 years ago. The Kenilworth and Hawick location is just one of dozens scattered around Southern California that have been adopted by the cliff swallows, ornithologists say.

The swallows always make a distinct impression. Bird droppings land everywhere, fouling porches, patios and people. Mud streaks walls and windows. Then there is the chirping that begins at the break of dawn. “They’re not songbirds,” Robert muttered.

But they are not without their defenders and protectors.

“We, at the Audubon Society, do not consider them a nuisance,” said Brenda Grinde of the group’s Los Angeles office. “But, unfortunately, that’s what the people who call us call them.”

It is a shame that anti-swallow types such as Robert do not appreciate just how lucky they are, said ornithologist Gene Cardiff. It bothers him that people do not realize how much trouble the swallows went to to get here, after having wintered as far south as Argentina.

Cardiff, curator of biological sciences at San Bernardino County Museum, ticked off a few virtues of the birds: They are master builders, constructing nests using bits of mud they collect in their beak and throat. They are exciting fliers--a frenetic, darting blur. They eat insects.

They are not bad-looking, either. A cliff swallow, Cardiff said, can be identified by a little white forehead, a rusty dark brownish throat down to the chest, a whitish belly, a dark back and wings, and a rusty orange rump patch.

“I’d love to have them nesting at my house,” he said. “In Japan, they’re treated as something sacred. If you knock a swallow nest off your home, you’re going to have problems.”

Meaning bad luck. Swallow terrorists in this part of the world, by contrast, may encounter Marie Palladini, a special agent of the U. S. Fish & Wildlife Service.

Cliff swallows are one of several species protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. To kill a swallow or destroy an occupied nest is a misdemeanor carrying a penalty of a $500 fine or six months in jail.

Swallow sympathizers love to remind the anti-swallow crowd of that law. Just about every spring, Palladini said, somebody fingers a neighbor, a landlord or a contractor trying to eradicate the birds illegally.

“Generally, we try to do more of a public relations campaign rather than a heavy-duty law enforcement effort,” Palladini said. If a homeowner seeks advice, she will point out that although it is illegal to knock down a completed nest, it is not a violation to wipe out a nest under construction. The assumption is the swallows will find friendlier surroundings elsewhere.

Ignorance of the law is no excuse. But that is what Ernie Foster, 79, pleaded when informed of swallows’ legal protections.

“Really? Well, I broke the law last year,” he said.

Robert said he did not know about the law either. But he insisted that he never assaulted a completed nest.

“I’m beating them to the punch,” he declared.

And overhead, the swallows were starting over.