Words by Susan Prior, photograph above by Susanne Jutzeler
In the dawning light, from my deck a world away on a remote, pristine island in the South Pacific, I can see a gaggle of sparrows as they flit from the ground to the frangipani tree and back again. They fluff themselves in the small dishes they have made in the dust by the water tanks, then they flutter across to the bird bath, taking it in turns to freshen up. The group busily chirrups and twitters to each other; it’s all very social. Although primarily vegetarian, their nestlings need invertebrates to fledge successfully. At certain times of the year you can see them, heads cocked, as they pick out grubs from the grass, or swooping in under my wide verandas to pluck spiders from the rafters. The males bumptiously sport dark bibs, white cheeks and a rusty cap; the smaller females defer in their dun and buff drab. They may not be much to look at, but who doesn’t love the impudence of the common or garden house sparrow? Their hops and struts and the twisting of their tails?
QUICK FACTS
Scientific Name: Passer domesticus
Common Name: House Sparrow, Common Sparrow, Sparrow
Lifespan: 3–4 years
Size: 12–15 cm
Weight: 24–40 gm
Wingspan: 23 cm
Conservation Status: Least concern
We have a robust and healthy population of sparrows on Norfolk Island, not living in the woodland areas of our national park, but right next to us, dwelling comfortably near our homes. Truth be told, they aren’t the kind of bird to inspire artists or poets, but I think we can safely say that many of us have a soft spot for these characterful little birds. Of all the wild birds, sparrows are the most closely associated with humans. As we have spread across the globe, so the plucky sparrow has followed, even half-way around the world to tiny Norfolk Island. This is Passer domesticus – the house sparrow.
This familiar species, as we know from the historical records, first arrived in Australia around the 1860s. Research done in 2016, using primary resources such as newspaper articles and acclimatisation societies’ records, has given us a definitive insight into when sparrows arrived in Australia, where they came from, why they came and how many. Nineteen birds arrived safely in Melbourne on the Princess Royal on 26 January 1863. Much later that same year, a further single female bird – the sole survivor of a flock of 160 – was documented in Ballarat as being brought from Europe by Mr A. Weber. However, preceding these ‘official’ imports – by the acclimatisation societies that were popping up in Australia – there is clear evidence that eleven sparrows had already arrived from India in a private shipment for Mr A. Landells in November 1862. In The Sydney Morning Herald, 16 February 1863, the enterprising Mr Landells was even advertising the sale of birds from India at ten shillings a pop, or about $75 in today’s money, to the Acclimatisation Society of New South Wales.
In Australia, sparrows thrived and bred. Over the next few years more birds were imported until by about 1869 these shipments were either no longer considered newsworthy, or imports ceased. It is difficult to ascertain which.
At the same time the Australian acclimatisation societies were encouraging the importation of sparrows, back in Great Britain and Europe there was much debate about the ‘sparrow clubs’ that had popped up in order to encourage the culling of the birds. Sparrows had proliferated to the extent that they were declared the enemies of all farmers and gardeners, accused of destroying crops. Hunting and killing them was actively encouraged with prizes and bounties on offer. One woman killed 800 small birds in one fell swoop by using strychnine in her garden. Another ‘prize winner’ boasted of having killed 1,860 sparrows in the course of a year. Others debated against this folly, with many letters written to the editors of local newspapers arguing that sparrows kept the insects at bay. However, their protestations must have gone unheeded, because as the songbirds disappeared, silence fell across the laneways and copses of England and parts of Europe. The ramifications were many, and in some areas it became necessary to employ people to remove insects and caterpillars from fruit and vegetables, while weeds grew uncontrollably. With little competition for food, vermin took over people’s gardens.
Half-way back around the world from where I now live, and what seems to me to be a lifetime ago when I was a student in London in the late 70s and early 80s, sparrows, or spuggies as we called them, were ubiquitous. Seemingly recovered from their earlier persecution, flocks of them hopped and wheeled around London’s train stations, cheeky spuggies fought over picnic crumbs in the parks, and bothersome flights circled over the food scraps abandoned by patrons in outdoor seating areas of cafés.
Photo by Benjamin Lecomte
Sparrows have chutzpah. They are like the East London wide boys – wheeling and dealing and living on their wits; grafting and grifting through life to make a crust. Dodging trouble. They experienced a decline in numbers at around the time of the introduction of the internal combustion engine and the disappearance of horses from London’s streets. Spillage from nose bags and undigested seeds in horse dung had provided a steady and plentiful source of nutrition for the birds. Then in the 1990s, their numbers took a rapid downward trajectory – people began to take notice and comment. On a journey back to the UK in the early 2000s, it was one of the first things I noticed. Where were the sparrows? It was a stark contrast to the last time I had visited. Since the 1990s when this rapid decline was first noticed, their numbers have reduced by 71 per cent. Their demise has been mirrored across Western Europe, India and North America. And recently, this same decline has been noticed in Australia even though, within living memory, people can recall Councils in Australia offering threepence bounty per head.
We have so much to thank Max Nicholson, a pioneer ornithologist, who not only set up the British Trust for Ornithology, but also was a man with great foresight. In 1925, at 21 years of age, he and his brother surveyed the sparrow population in Kensington Gardens in London. That year they counted 2,603. Over the ensuing years there was a steady and gradual decline in numbers. His research reflected what people were noticing – in the 1990s their numbers plummeted. In 2000, seventy-five years after he and his brother first counted the sparrows in Kensington Gardens, and now 96 years old, he undertook his last sparrow count with the help of members of London’s Natural History Society. They found eight birds. Just eight.
Like Icarus whose wings melted when he flew too near the sun, so the sparrows melted away from our urban lives and out of our skies. Alarm bells rang. People started to notice. We had taken our cheeky friends for granted, assuming they would always be there. Many reasons for the decrease in numbers have been put forward, and much research has been done without any definitive conclusions. It is an environmental conundrum. Habitat loss, parasite infections, changes in building architecture, loss of green space, decreasing food supplies, and increasing pollution have all been mooted. Birds are recognised as an important indicator of the quality of life. It begs the question about what such a reduction in numbers tells us about the quality of life in our urban areas.
A name that kept surfacing as I researched this article was that of Denis Summers-Smith, a world expert on sparrows, who is now 98 years old. He has a theory, only supported by circumstantial evidence, that the rise in numbers of diesel-engine vehicles may be connected to the reduction in sparrow numbers. Summers-Smith freely admits that he no longer has the energy to undertake the necessary research, but suggests it would certainly be worthwhile.
So alarmed have people been about the decline in the sparrow population that a group in India, known as the Nature Forever Society, came up with the idea of World Sparrow Day to highlight the birds’ decreasing numbers, and also – more broadly and, I think, more importantly – for the sparrow to be an ambassador to improve the quality of our urban environments.
But let’s travel back to Norfolk Island where I now live and the serenity of my backyard. Opinions vary, but after more than 50 years thriving and spreading across Australia, sparrows hopped, skipped and jumped their way to Norfolk Island, more than likely as stowaways, in around 1919 or 1920 – 100 years ago. Unwittingly with an eye on the main chance, perhaps, but here they have settled in and are flourishing nicely.
Norfolk Island’s resident bird expert, Margaret Christian writes:
Many visiting birders tell me that they hardly see sparrows anymore, where they were once a common sight around homes and especially eateries, where you would expect the popular move to al fresco dining would have favoured their scrounging habits.
We should pay attention. Even the humblest small creature can teach us a thing or two. Sparrows may not be listed on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species, nor are they likely to be any time soon, but maybe they are our 21st century canaries signalling that not all is well in our urban environments. Christian suggests that we need to treat our Norfolk population of sparrows as a remnant population, capable of persistence in a safe haven, tucked away on a beautiful unspoilt rock in the South Pacific.
At dawn, as I sip my tea and survey my garden from the vantage of the deck, I feel privileged to have washed up on the shores of Norfolk Island along with the sparrow; for me these birds in my yard gently remind me of how lucky we are to live here in such a pristine environment.
