Where Have all the House Sparrows Gone

THRISSUR: If one misses the sight of house sparrows hopping from branch to branch in the bushes outside one’s house and their chirping recently, nothing to wonder, it’s true that their population has been dwindling rapidly in India. And one more World House Sparrow Day (March 20) went off without any outcry or steps from the side of authorities to help the birds in their fight against survival.Dr V S Vijayan, of Salim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History, Thrissur, told ‘Express’ that there had been no concrete study on the disappearance of house sparrows. Even as India has seen a massive decline of sparrows in the recent years, there has been no constructive steps initiated here to protect these birds.Other countries have started to protect the sparrows by enlisting them in the Red List of Endangered Avian Species.  Their recent decline has earned them a place on the Red List in the Netherlands and the UK. Similar precipitous drop in population has been recorded in France, Germany, the Czech Republic, Belgium, Italy and Finland.Electromagnetic radiations from the mobile towers are one of the main reasons for their rapid disappearance. The introduction of unleaded petrol, the combustion of which produces compounds such as methyl nitrite, a compound that is highly toxic to small insects, which forms a major part of a young sparrow’s diet; decrease of proper nesting sites forces them to look for any man-made nook or cranny, kitchen garden and lofts etc. to build their nests. The overuse of pesticides in fields and kitchen garden have badly affected these birds, Vijayan said.