Separating the two Striped Swallows is easily done by looking at any of three features.
- Ear covert colour
- Vent markings
- Type of chest streaking
The ear coverts on Greater Striped are white with very fine streaks. On Lesser Striped, the orange of the cap extends onto the ear coverts making them plain orange.
The chest streaking also differs. Greater Striped has finer chest streaking that does not look nearly as bold from a distance. This compares with the much bolder streaking of Lesser Striped.
The last feature is the vent markings. On Lesser Stiped, the orange of the rump wraps around onto the vent giving two little orange marks on the vent. This does not happen on Greater Striped, meaning the vent lacks these orange marks.
Songs and calls
The songs and calls of the two Striped Swallows are easily recogniseable. Overall the Lesser Striped has a far more nasal and scratchy sound compared to Greater Striped.Firstly looking at the song, Greater Striped has a jumbled and more muscial swallow-like song. Lesser Striped on the other hand has a strikng nasal call with descending single notes. It is also far slower than the song of Greater Striped.
Firstly looking at the flight call of Greater Striped, it has a similarly bubbly short phrase for a flight call. This contrasts with the single flight call note of Lesser Striped that has a nasal and scratchy sound similar to the song.