The House Sparrow

Front matter

THE

HOUSE SPARROW.

"Ye are of more value than many sparrows."

The House Sparrow: by an Ornithologist

THE HOUSE SPARROW,

By an Ornithologist,

J. H. GURNEY, Junr.

THE common house sparrow (Passer domesticus; fringillidæ, the finch tribe) has some enthusiastic patrons in this country among the friends of dumb animals, and it has many deadly enemies among farmers and gardeners. I do not propose to enter into the charges brought against it by gardeners, so much as to treat the question from a farmer's point of view.

No one can for a moment doubt that the sparrow question is now a very important one, and that it is becoming, year by year, more so; that is, if only a tithe of what has been said and written about it at farmers' clubs and in agricultural newspapers be true. A large farmer in Cheshire told his audience at a meeting last year that in his opinion sparrows, assisted by other small birds, had done the country £770,094 worth of damage in a year, reckoning a bushel per acre all over the kingdom (vide The Times, Sept. 13th, 1884, Chester Courant, Aug. 27th). If this tremendous estimate be anywhere near the mark it may well be asked, 'Is any consumption of insects in summer likely to make amends for it?' Yet it appears to be the deduction of a careful man, made to a very sympathetic audience, who had suffered largely in their district, near Chester.

THE POINT AT ISSUE.

The point at issue—and it is only by discussing it temperately that we shall arrive at the truth, and by entirely putting aside prejudice which has marked many utterances on the subject—is, Would the caterpillars and seeds of weeds, which the sparrows eat, consume, or injure, as much agricultural produce as the sparrows consume? And if the sparrows were all dead, it may be asked, 'Would other birds keep down these seeds and caterpillars as fully as they are kept down now?' Nineteen farmers out of twenty would say at the outset, that there can be no question at all about the matter—that sparrows do so much harm to crops, that it is impossible that any number of caterpillars upon which their young are fed, can be enough to compensate. On the other hand, the friends of the sparrow are equally one-sided. Having settled in their own minds that it is a mistake to destroy any small birds, and forgetful of the warnings which come to us from the United States and New Zealand, and every colony where the sparrow has been introduced, they shut their eyes to its misdeeds, and will only look at its merits.

'There can, I think, be no doubt,' writes the Rev. F. O. Morris, 'but that the harm they may do, even granting it to be considerable, is compensated, and more than compensated, by that which they prevent.'—Brit. Birds, ii., p. 278.

This appears to be the opinion of several other naturalists; and, although one fact is worth a peck of theories, their opinions are not to be disregarded.

THE HABITS OF THE SPARROW.

The various ways in which sparrows do harm to crops are well known to agriculturists; but, perhaps, by no one has the sequence of their proceedings in the field been better put than by the Rev. C. A. Johns (Brit. Birds, p. 202). Sometimes they make descents on the standing corn before the grain has attained full size, and near the hedges the busy pilferers are at work, and fly up in a swarm as you approach them; but when it is quite ripe they do the greatest harm. It is not only what they eat, but what they knock out. A gentleman, who is a practical farmer in Nort Lincolnshire—Mr. J. Cordeaux—tells me he has seen acres which had the appearance of being threshed with a flail. Taking this into consideration, the opinion of the Melbourne (Derbyshire) Sparrow Club—that sparrows destroy a quart of corn apiece during the summer (vide Zoologist, p. 2299)—is probably true. If 30 grains a day is a sparrow's ordinary meal during June, July, and August [and I do not think this is far from the mark, having repeatedly found 20 and 25 whole grains, and once, in November, 40, in a sparrow's crop], it would have eaten, during those three months, 2,760 grains, which is nearly a third of a pint; or if, take the whole year round, each sparrow eats on an average 15 grains a day, then each sparrow eats in a year 5,475 grains. This is none too high an estimate, for the quantity which sparrows eat at stacks in winter time equals what they take from the fields in the summer. During the operations of harvest, I understand they may often be seen sticking to the gradually lessening square of corn until all the field is cut. They then transfer their attentions to the sheaves, and also divide with the gleaners what is left on the stubble. Finally, when the farmer has sold his produce, sparrows take a very large toll out of any portion of it which a purchaser may give to his poultry, as every breeder of chickens and turkeys knows very well. At the end of September a marked decrease is to be seen in their numbers, but whether this is caused by real emigration or by local movements is not clear. It has often been said that sparrows come to us over the North Sea in the autumn; but among the numerous 'wings' I have had from lighthouses and light-vessels I have never received this species. In October sparrows pack into flocks of from 200 to 300 and leave the homesteads. That month is mostly spent in the fields, and so is November; and here they find plenty of occupation, sometimes hunting on their own account, sometimes with other small birds. With the first fall of snow away they go to the stacks, on the sides of which they may be seen clustering; or, if it is not too deep, searching on the ground for grain which has been shaken out, with chaffinches and yellow-hammers. At all times stacks are a great attraction. It is said that preference is given to a wheat-stack; but sparrows are not particular so long as they can get grain. Needless to say, that threshing is a matter of the highest interest to sparrows.

February and March are spent almost entirely in the vicinity of houses and farmyards, or any place where corn is to be found, unless, as previously mentioned, they are attracted to a distance by the operation of threshing. I agree in thinking that at this period the opinion of Colonel Russell, who continues the discussion after me, that corn forms 90% of their food, is true. At the end of March fields are sown, and sparrows show not infrequently, by their presence, that they wish to levy the usual tribute; but it is certain that where a drill is used the grain is deposited too deeply in the soil for any small birds to reach it, except skylarks, which are said to dig it up sometimes; but sparrows get the drilled barley and oats when they begin to sprout.

In addition to the remarks already made on this point—the damage done to corn by sparrows—it would be easy to cite many instances of great and unusual harm caused to tenant-farmers by sparrows, but they are too vague for the purpose; indeed, in such a matter it is exceedingly difficult to be precise. In some instances, and especially near towns, extraordinary estimates have been formed of the damage by the most competent valuers, but as these valuers were not Ornithologists, it is not clear that some of the damage was not done by greenfinches and chaffinches. I have seen large flocks in the fields in November, which I at first thought were sparrows, but which proved on closer inspection to be entirely composed of the species just named.

The following true story was related to me by Colonel Russell:—A farmer at Boreham, near Chelmsford, named Hurrell, had an early field of wheat not far from the village. The sparrows attacked it in the corner nearest the village and devoured a great deal there: the crop was uniform, except from what the sparrows did. Hurrell measured an acre where the sparrows had been at work, and an adjoining acre which they had not meddled with, and thrashed the corn on each of the acres separately, looking after the threshing himself. He found the deficiency to be 2 quarters (16 bushels); value at the time £6.

THE FOOD OF YOUNG SPARROWS.

The sparrow lays five or six greyish-white eggs spotted with brown and ash-colour, and has frequently three broods in the year, the first being hatched towards the end of May. Young sparrows in the nest are generally fed on caterpillars and other insects, particularly in August, yet a good many may be opened in June and July without finding any in them. The parent sparrows will begin to feed them on caterpillars when but a day old, but they seem to discontinue the diet a little time before they leave the nest, though, on the other hand, some young sparrows, which were quite ready to leave the nest, examined in Norfolk, did contain a few small caterpillars. But of this I am sure, that while very young their diet is quite as much unripe corn and vegetable matter as caterpillars. Even at the age of one day a sparrow will feed its young one on a grain of ripe corn. Say that a young sparrow eats 14 or 15 young caterpillars a day, that is probably as good a guess as we can make. If this only went on for ten days the sum-total destroyed would be very vast, and some of the caterpillars of very injurious kinds, such as Caradrina cubicularis, the pale mottled willow moth of Curtis ('Farm Insects,' p. 308), identified for me by Mr. C. G. Barrett and the Rev. J. Hellins.

If one-fourth of the young sparrows hatched in England are fed for ten days on 14 caterpillars apiece, it is easy to make a calculation of how many they would eat in a large agricultural county like Norfolk. Norfolk contains 800 parishes: say that 800 young sparrows are annually hatched in each parish; that gives us a total of 640,000 sparrows. If one-fourth of them are fed on caterpillars, we should have 22,400,000 of these destructive creatures eaten in this one county alone, every year, by sparrows. So that there is a very nice balance to adjust in a matter which the most expert observer might find difficult. On the one hand the young sparrows are fed on a great many caterpillars; on the other hand they are fed with grain, but this is mixed with weeds and other vegetable matter. Again, there is a side light in which to look at the question:—If the sparrows were dead, how many of these caterpillars would be eaten by other small birds? We may be quite sure that a considerable portion of them would not be eaten, unless chaffinches and greenfinches become more numerous than they are now; and if this was so, would not they speedily become much more addicted to corn? I think there is not a doubt about it.

SPARROWS KEEP DOWN WEEDS.

Sparrows do much good to the farmer, in conjunction with many other little birds, by consuming vast numbers of the seeds of weeds. I think not nearly enough has been made of this by their friends and supporters. The following is a list of those which have been actually identified, with my authority for each:

Wild spinach (Chenpodium bonus-henricus), Mr. A. Willis. Knot grass (Polygonum aviculare), Mr. F. A. Lees. Black or corn bindweed (P. convolvulus), Mr. F. A. Lees. Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale). Goosefoot (Chenopodium album), Mr. F. A. Lees. Field mustard (Sinapis arvensis), Professor Macgillivray. Chickweed (Stellaria media), Colonel Russell. Mouse Ear (Cerastium triviale) Professor Macgillivray. Wild radish (Raphanus raphanistrum), Professor Macgillivray. Dock (Rumex crispus), Mr. F. A. Lees. Pale-flowered persicaria (Polygonum lapathifolium), Mr. F. A. Lees. Buttercup, Mr. H. N. Slater.

These seeds will spread from a hedge, the sides of which are not brushed with a reaping-hook in the summer, and make a field very foul; so that everyone must admit that sparrows and small birds generally do some amount of good by keeping them down. A remarkable instance was mentioned some years ago in the Times, of a field sown with grass and clover seeds, over which a luxuriant growth of knot grass (P. aviculare) spread. The farmer thought that his crop was ruined, but in September such swarms of sparrows as he had never seen before visited the field and fed on the small shining seeds of the knot grass. I regret that I have neither got the date of the letter, nor the name of the writer, the communication, according to a bad practice prevalent among observers, being anonymous.

A sparrow's crop will contain a great many small seeds. Dr. Schleh found 321 whole seeds of chickweed in the crop of one sparrow in Germany! In one shot at Northrepps, in Norfolk, 147 were actually counted, and many more were ground up into pulp in the gizzard. Digestion is rapid, and at this rate a vast number would be consumed in a very short time.

It need hardly be said that the present contribution, including the Table which follows, does not exhaust the sparrow controversy. It leaves many interesting points almost untouched.

THE FOOD OF SPARROWS

During each Month of the Year.

Six hundred and ninety-four dissections have been made in the preparation of the following Table, by various hands, in various places. They have been made at nearly regular intervals—certainly during every month of the year, and I may almost say during every week. It is therefore hoped they will give a reliable idea of what the customary food of sparrows is, and what their occasional food. I confess this latter phrase is somewhat vague, but have felt the necessity of employing it in default of a better. The column under this heading might no doubt be further extended.

Maize has only been entered under two months; but where sparrows have an opportunity of obtaining it, maize would be found in their crops at any time of the year. They will also eat bread, potatoes, rice, pastry, raisins, currants, etc., but as these things have no bearing on the amount of harm which sparrows do to agriculture, they are not included in the Table. Credit must be given to them as scavengers in a small way in our crowded cities, where they consume matter such as I have named, which, if left, would decay and be injurious to health.

Among those who have assisted in the inquiry my thanks are especially due to my father, Mr. A. Willis, Mr. B. B. Sapwell, Mr. G. Roberts, Mr. F. Norgate, Mr. C. L. Buxton, Mr. T. Southwell, Mr. T. E. Gunn, Mr. F. A. Lees, Mr. C. G. Barrett, Mr. H. H. Slater, and Colonel Russell. I have further availed myself of sundry notes published in the Zoologist, by Messrs. Hepburn, Hawley, and Wilson; and some material has been gathered from other scattered sources, which I have particularized in the Table.

FOOD OF ADULT SPARROWS.

| Their customary food. | Their occasional food.

|JANUARY. | |Corn from stacks and from poultry-yards; seeds of all kinds. | |Refuse corn, such as is scattered in roads, and would never be of use; maize. Capsules of moss (H. H. Slater).

|FEBRUARY. | |Corn from stacks and poultry-yards. | |Seeds; buds of gooseberries (G. Roberts).

|MARCH. | |Corn wherever they can get it. | |Young tops of peas, radish, cabbage, and cauliflower; seeds (Wilson); freshly sown barley and oats.

|APRIL. | |Corn; vegetable matter. | |Freshly sown barley and oats; oblong green seeds, not identified; caterpillars.

|MAY. | |Corn; vegetable matter; seeds. | |Young pea-pods and leaves of peas; gooseberry-blossoms and young gooseberries; small beetles; caterpillars of the Brimstone Moth, and White Cabbage butterflies (J. Hawley); turnip-seed (A. Hepburn and R. Lowe); hayseed (C. L. Buxton); sprouts of young barley, half an inch long; pollen of the sycamore tree and apple (Note A, page 17); mangold-wurtzel leaves (B. B. Sapwell).

|JUNE. | |Corn; vegetable matter; peas; seeds of various sorts. | |Gooseberries and other fruit; lettuces (A. Willis); small beetles; mangold-wurtzel leaves (B. B. Sapwell) (Note B, page 18).

|JULY. | |Young wheat, barley, and oats; vegetable matter; seeds of various weeds. | |Peas; small beetles; beans (A. Willis); seeds of wild spinach (A. Willis).

|AUGUST. | |Wheat, barley, oats. | |Seeds of corn, bindweed, knot grass, etc. (see list, page 9); aphides, small beetles, daddy longlegs (Tipula), caterpillars of Teras contaminana, moth of Crambus culmellus (Note C, page 18) (E. F. Becher and F. Norgate).

|SEPTEMBER. | |Corn; seeds of many kinds, especailly the knot grass and corn bindweed. | |Caterpillars; berries; seeds of plantain (T. Southwell).

|OCTOBER. | |Grain, some of it refuse grain; seeds of many kinds, including knot grass. | |

|NOVEMBER. | |Grain; seeds of plants. | |Newly sown seeds of wheat; small caterpillars.

|DECEMBER. | |Grain, principally obtained from stacks. | |Seeds; maize. Sprouting bean (H. H. Slater).

FOOD OF YOUNG SPARROWS TO THE TIME OF LEAVING THE NEST.

| Their customary food. | Their occasional food.

|MAY. | |Grains of last year's corn; small beetles; caterpillars. | |Buds (F. Norgate). Red spider (J.H.G.) Hairworms (J.H.G.) Small flies (J. H.G.).

|JUNE. | |Caterpillars of various kinds, up to three-quarters of an inch in length; young wheat. | |Beetles; large brown cabbage-moth (W. Johns); wireworm.

|JULY. | |Caterpillars, beetles; soft, milky grains of wheat and barley. | |Blue-bottle flies (J. Duff).

|AUGUST. | |Caterpillars, beetles; young corn. | |Small chrysalides.

To give a summary of this Table in a few words, it may be said that about 75% of an adult sparrow's food during its life is corn of some kind. The remaining 25% may be roughly divided as follows:

Seeds of weeds | 10 | %

Green Peas | |4

Beetles | |3

Caterpillars | |2

Insects which fly | |1

Other things | |5

In young sparrows not more than 40% is corn, while about 40% consists of caterpillars, and 10% of small beetles. This is up to the age of sixteen days. Where green peas abound, as in market gardens, they form a much larger proportion of the sparrows' food than the 4% here stated.

Sparrows generally contain in their gizzards a considerable quantity of small stones, gravel, sand, brick, coal, etc., but these are only intended to grind the real food. In default of these substances they will swallow small mollusks, fragments of egg-shell, fragments of snail-shells, etc.

Sparrows should be killed for dissection in the afternoon. In adult sparrows the crop will generally give a far better idea of their day's meal than the gizzard, in which the food is so comminuted as to be with difficulty identified. If the sparrows are caught at night, they have digested their food in a great measure, and yield much less satisfactory results: the crops at that time are always empty.

NOTE A.

It seems that the actual blossom is not eaten, but rather that a portion of it is masticated for the drop of nectar at the base of the petals. For the same reason the crocus and other garden flowers alluded to at p. 1 (note) are destroyed. The blossoms of fruit-trees seem to be attacked for the pollen.

NOTE B.

Mr. R. Lowe has observed them feeding on the young unopened buds of swede turnips just bursting into flower for seed.—(Report on Observations on Injurious Insects, 1883.)

NOTE C.

I have notes of sparrows occasionally feeding on the yellow Underwing, Ermine moth, and a few other insects in the perfect state, but the date at which the observation was made not having been taken down, it can only be approximately guessed at from the time at which they usually appear. Everybody must, at some time or another, have observed their clumsy efforts to catch some common butterfly.

Peascod, emptied by a sparrow.

The House Sparrow: by a Friend of the Farmers

THE HOUSE SPARROW.

By a Friend of the Farmers,

COLONEL C. RUSSELL.

The sparrow question has interested me from childhood; the first definite observation I can remember was that of opening half-grown nestling sparrows some fifty years back, and finding in their gizzards ripe wheat about June 20, when none could be got in the fields; the nearest place where it was likely to be found being a farmyard about half a mile distant. It struck me at once; so much for calculations of the numbers of insects destroyed by sparrows, based on counting the visits of sparrows to their nest, and assuming that they carried in nothing but insects. From that time or earlier I have observed the habits of sparrows; up to 1870 only loosely, and my impression then was that they lived mainly on corn, and though they took a few insects sometimes, that they no more lived on them than boys live on nuts and blackberries.

One most objectionable habit I have noticed from the first—that of turning the house-martins out of their nests as fast as they build them. A decrease in the numbers of the martins by this persecution has been going on steadily for the last fifty years, till they are, according to my estimate, not one-fiftieth as numerous as they have been within my memory. Every year the martins are finally banished by the sparrows from numbers of places where they have built, in ever decreasing numbers, for years. I could give any number of instances of this. Passing through villages where formerly there were hundreds of martins, one now sees none, or perhaps some three or four nests, all, or nearly so, occupied by sparrows. In districts where any martins are still left, they will keep on building a nest or two in favourite places every year, only to be turned out of them; and particularly within a radius of a few miles round my place, which supplies a large yearly surplus of them, they try to establish themselves on every new suitable building—but all in vain. Of all the colonies of martins that I have been acquainted with anywhere, I do not know of one now remaining, and the only successful new one within my knowledge where the martins are not protected by killing the sparrows (an exception which goes to prove the rule), is at the ruins of Thorndon Hall near Brentwood, burnt out a few years since. This house is in the middle of a park; probably the sparrows do not care to live there because no corn is to be had near enough to please them.

The martins, which feed exclusively on insects, if left in possession of their nests, would, unlike many other birds, increase with the population of the country and number of houses. Besides the persecution by sparrows, there is no condition unfavourable to the martins except that when, with their natural confidence in man, too often misplaced, they make their nests close to windows or doors for protection, people commonly destroy them; thus completing the exterminating work of the sparrows. I have heard it said 'they must come there for mischief; they might build anywhere else.' Few seem to notice that, unless where sparrows dare not come, the martins cannot keep a nest. The only thing which saves these birds from total extermination in this country seems to be this—they sometimes manage to rear a late brood after the 'fell adversary to house-martins' (as White of Selborne rightly called the sparrow) has left off nesting and betaken himself to the wheat-fields. But in this way the martins are kept here too long, and sometimes, before their young can fly, are caught by sharp frost in October, and die. The last numerous colony that I knew of, within a few miles of my house, was thus cleared out a few years ago, while my martins, protected from sparrows, and always getting their young off in good time, took no harm.

About my premises the martins, formerly numerous, as elsewhere became fewer and fewer until in 1869 they had nearly disappeared, young ones flying, I think, from only two nests—one close to a window, the other to a door. Towards the end of May, 1870, several nests freshly built under the eaves of the pigeon-house, their favourite place, were all found to be in the possession of sparrows. The indignation with which I had seen this persecution all my life at last boiled over, and, resolving that the martins should have one safe place, I began to protect them by killing down the sparrows. It was a hard fight at first; the martins' nests had to be watched almost constantly, and, if I remember rightly, 150 sparrows were shot—mostly about these nests—in about a fortnight. War has been waged against them ever since. The first year or two we did not take the trouble to kill them in winter, but this did not answer; a great number lived about the place, many roosting in the martins' nests. When we began shooting the sparrows in spring they would all go away for a day or two, but kept coming back again, so that constant watchfulness for weeks was required to kill them down; the plan was therefore adopted of paying a penny for shooting each sparrow as soon as it shows itself all the year round. They are shot with very small charges of dust shot, mostly from inside doors and windows, or from loopholes made to command the places they generally come to; they dislike this practice, and do not come much—less and less every year. The plan has been most successful; the place is wonderfully free from sparrows—sometimes we do not see one for weeks together—and the martins have increased in numbers, till last year they had 170 nests about my house and buildings, and this year there are 237, and more will be built yet.

The food in the sparrows killed at first (June, 1870) was examined and found to be mostly corn and broken maize, for which they went to a farmyard nearly half a mile off. In this way becoming much interested in the subject, I investigated the food and habits of sparrows with special care during some seven years, and worked pretty hard collecting from a wide extent of country, and examining the food in thousands, old and young; old ones from all sorts of places at all times of year, young ones from wherever I could get any all through the breeding season. The result, confirmed by occasional examinations up to the present time, was that I found that sparrows destroy even fewer insects than I had supposed. The food in the old ones was almost all corn during the whole year; green peas (of course bitten up small) were also found in them in summer; and in May and June, when corn is scarce, a few wild seeds, chiefly of grass. No insect has been found by me in a sparrow between September and March. I have not often found one at any season (particularly between June and March) in a sparrow old enough to feed itself, and have very seldom found any number of insects in one—even when corn could scarcely be got. The food of young sparrows was found to vary greatly; of those taken at the same time from one farmyard, some broods contained insects, some corn, green or ripe, or green peas, and a few green seeds, chiefly of grass, and in many would be a mixture of some or all these. The kind of food by no means always depends on the age of the birds; the first food after being hatched given to a young sparrow is commonly a small green caterpillar, but large callow ones a few days old are often full of ripe wheat, and some ready to fly contain insects chiefly. My observations showed plainly that to get results of any value an investigation of sparrows' food must be made on a large scale; otherwise very erroneous deductions may be made. For instance, once in June I found in forty-seven nestling sparrows of all ages from one farmyard scarcely anything except old wheat and green peas; there were only about six insects in the whole number. From such an instance it might be inferred that nestling sparrows are fed with little else than corn and peas, while another instance taken alone might be thought to prove that insects were almost their only food.

The following is, according to my observation, an outline of the life-history of a country sparrow. After being reared in the nest on some or all the sorts of food just mentioned, according to the notions of his parents (and these notions differ greatly with the same opportunities), if there is nothing ready for him in the fields, he lives, on corn and green peas if these things are to be found, about buildings, yards, gardens and roads (unless a field of early peas tempt him out sooner), till corn is forming in the ear, when he and his kind begin their ravages on it as soon as it will afford them a little milky stuff in the ears. If he does not leave the nest till this time or later, he quickly betakes himself to the cornfields. As time goes on, he and his fellows go further into and stay more in the fields, till, by September or earlier, most of them live in them altogether, sitting on the hedges by day and roosting in them by night, and feeding entirely on corn, until, generally at some time in October, all the corn on the stubbles is sprouting or rotting; he then eats a few wild seeds; but when these and damaged corn are all he can get in the fields, he soon leaves them and goes home to houses and farmyards, getting his food with fowls and pigs, on the roads and at stacks, especially after these are threshed out. He lives thus till spring, except that at autumn seed-time he has a turn at the wheatfields, picking up what grain he can get at before it has time to sprout. In March I have sometimes found a small soft beetle or two, occasionally a small caterpillar, or often a piece of tender green leaf, among his cropful of corn. At spring seed-time he has another turn at the corn fields. In May and June he often finds it difficult to get as much corn as he would like, and goes eagerly to any place where he has a chance of getting it, but often has to make shift with wild seeds; he seems, too, to like a little green grass seed with his old corn, and contrives to find some very early in the year; most likely in warm sheltered places near buildings. I once found some sparrows full of chickweed-seed in May. At this season he gets wild seeds near houses, in gardens or meadows adjoining, but, so far as I have observed, does not go far into the fields for them. Now we come round to the time when he can get plenty of his favourite food; perhaps green peas in June, and any amount of green corn in July.