In 1990, wildlife biologist Jim Ray was attending South Dakota State University to complete his master’s degree when he saw the bird that would shape the rest of his life. Ray was visiting a college buddy who had installed a martin house: a birdhouse that’s mounted on a pole and sometimes resembles a gourd or miniaturized apartment building. The backyard structure was inhabited by purple martins, a flashy and personable member of the swallow family known for gathering in large numbers and performing extreme aerial acrobatics. “I couldn’t take my eyes off them,” Ray remembers. “The purple martin feeds high up in the air, way higher than other swallows. Then they will fold their wings, and in one swoop, they drop into their cavity. When…The post Purple Martins Are on the Wing in Texas appeared first on Texas Monthly.