House Sparrow

ppink

In April I was delighted to find we had a house sparrow take up residence. The delight is now wearing thin:(

In April he took over the pitch of our roof over the bedroom, this was fine no problem. The housemartins arrived home in May and rebuilt the nest they had there in the gable end. they moved in but were uncerimoniously dumped out one day with a load of screeching. HS had taken over the housemartins nest. first I thought he was literally trying to sing them out of the nest until one day he just had enough and went in and turfed them out altogether.
So then he moved into my bathroom. I cant leave the velux open at all but he is in. This is fine, I just work around it.
What the reall issue is now that he fights with the window from 4am EVERY morning. He is literally bashing himself off the window constantly, I assume he is fighting with his shadow?????
Anyway i dont know how to stop this. this morning if I had my tennis racket close by he might have ended up in the next county;). A spud gun has even been threatened:eek:;).
So is there any way to stop him waging war on the whole house but particularly my bedroom window?:)

Half-cocked

You could try a plastic bird of prey on the window sill, it might persuade him to move on. Trouble is it will scare off other species too. Before you do anything, make sure the Sparrow isn't nesting as it is illegal to do anything that would interfere in this. Is it just one Sparrow? They usually flock. Sounds like you have an anti social bird:D Might explain the aggressive behaviour.

ppink

Thanks Half-cocked. I think it is just the one bird. At one stage I wondered if he had a female and young in the nest but I dont think so now.
It is really the bashing off the window I want to stop as well first I cant sleep as it hits it every 30 seconds or so and then I am wondering how he is even able to keep up the war. he is relentless! how he is not injured by now is a mystery.
Is there anything I can do to stop him seeing the reflection i wonder?

not really keen on trying the bird of prey. I have loads of little birds here and I do love waking to them singing.

ThunderCat

Sounds like he is trying to fight off his reflection which no doubt he sees as another male sparrow invading his territory. The bird of prey sticker on the window is sometimes used but I totally understand you dont want to scare away all the other birds that visit your garden. What you could use is ordinary white A4 paper, the type you find in a printer. If you bluetac it to the part of your window that he is boucing off, it should hopefully stop the problem as the white paper will absorb the light and not give off a reflection. Just take it down again when you wake up in the morning. Depending on how wide your window is you may need a few sheets but it might work. Failing that, maybe a flower pot or something similar on your window ledge might deter him from landing there.

ppink

thanks TC its the whole window he is attacking. I wonder if a white sheet bluetacked over the window would stop the reflection? otherwise it will be a lot of A4 sheets of paper!

ppink

A short while after I posted the window attacks stopped. there is a nest full of little sparrows up there now so I reckon the folks are too busy wiht feeding to be fighting reflections.

It is funny to hear them all screeching for food:). will they have 2 lots of chicks this year or will this be it i wonder?

Is it normal for house sparrows to turf the poor housemartins out of their nest like this?? I kind of felt bad for the housemartins as they very diligently built the nest under the watchful eye of the sparrow and when it was done he took it over:eek:.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

It is very common to have House Sparrows evict Martins. If there are suitable locations for sparrows they would use them instead. Try putting up a Sparrow Terrace box so both species will be happy next year.

ppink

Well I picked myself up a copy of the BBC wildlife magazine a few motnhs back but only got around to looking at it yesterday. In it was a somewhat intriguing article on the house sparrow.

http://www.discoverwildlife.com/british-wildlife/house-sparrows-when-feathers-fly

So far, in considering the messy life of the house sparrow, you might have enjoyed the odd knowing chuckle. But recently some dark and unsettling behaviour has come to light. Adult birds grab hold of unrelated nestlings and pull them out of their nests, throwing them to their deaths.Both sexes do this – in fact, females are possibly more murderous than males. An intruding female steals her rival’s partner and then takes over the nest, killing the chicks. Sometimes she will even do this in sight of the male and the usurped female.Older females commit infanticide more often than inexperienced birds, and prefer to oust females paired with top-quality males. These mature birds will raise the most young – pointing to the chilling conclusion that infanticide is selected for. (One current theory is that females kill chicks in order to demonstrate their social status to both their new partners and the cuckolded females.)In males, infanticide is triggered by the loss of a mate. The widower forcibly breaks up the pair bond of a neighbouring couple, kills their young and mates with the very female he has just bereaved.Many people would be surprised to learn that a bird we tend to caricature as ‘cheeky’ or ‘chirpy’ is so ruthless, and that its life is full of intrigue and bloodshed.

I never knew that all this was possibly going on right literally over my bed without me knowing :eek:. It is like something out of a Mills & Boon type of book:p

I am sure those of you who are into birds probably know all this stuff already but for me a recent very amateur enthusiast it is kind of amazing to think of these little creatures engaging in such behaviours.

mgwhelan

ppink wrote: »

Well I picked myself up a copy of the BBC wildlife magazine a few motnhs back but only got around to looking at it yesterday. In it was a somewhat intriguing article on the house sparrow.

http://www.discoverwildlife.com/british-wildlife/house-sparrows-when-feathers-fly



I never knew that all this was possibly going on right literally over my bed without me knowing :eek:. It is like something out of a Mills & Boon type of book:p

I am sure those of you who are into birds probably know all this stuff already but for me a recent very amateur enthusiast it is kind of amazing to think of these little creatures engaging in such behaviours.

This happened with a pare using a house sparrow Terrace on our farm this year, first time they tried there eggs were turn out, they tried again chicks were only a day old when they were taken

Kess73

My regular house sparrows are being "treated" to an amazing show from my regular male sparrowhawk.


Since this morning I have seen nine clean kills by him, with many more no doubt having happened that I did not see.. His attack to kill ratio today is way above average, mainly due to the amount of young and inexperienced house sparrows.

He had one spell that took no longer than 8 minutes in total where he came into the garden four times with me standing there and still went away three times with a sparrow.

I know that some of his offspring this year have fledged, but are still at the stage where he is bringing food to them as they wait in the tree near where the nest was for him.

ppink

very familiar singing going on yesterday:rolleyes: I completely forgot the house sparrow terrace.
Where would I get details for a very simple one of these to make?

mgwhelan

hope this helps

Half-cocked

mgwhelan wrote: »

hope this helps

A strip of rubber along the hinged edge to stop rain seeping down the inside back of the nest box helps too.

mgwhelan

Half-cocked wrote: »

A strip of rubber along the hinged edge to stop rain seeping down the inside back of the nest box helps too.

A old tire cube from a bike comes in handy for that job.

kincsem

I bought a sparrow terrace from Haiths (slightly different from this model.)
http://www.haiths.com/Products/East-Coast-Sparrow-Terrace-WBNB01027/

No sparrows yet. I didn't have a good location for it. It might be sited too low / in too enclosed an area.