(took this picture in SACON campus; one of the nest boxes
we fixed for the birds)
Where have all the sparrows gone?
Long time passing
Where have all the sparrows gone?
Long time ago.........
.............................
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?
pete seeger will say sparrows instead of flowers if he re-writes the song
its hard for me to believe when i think about it..... the birds i grew up with, frequent visitors
to my terrace garden and childhood friends have gone extinct locally in many parts of India as in the rest of the world.
I have not seen a single one in and around IISc and I have asked the kids on campus to keep their eyes open.
Whoever sees one shall be generously awarded with chocolate.
Of the many hypotheses proposed for sparrow decline(including use of pesticides in farms and gardens, mobile towers, lack of granaries in city limits), decline of nesting sites was the one that sounded most serious to me. Some of the others raise concern for our own health.
In SACON we were looking at sparrow decline and monitoring parts of south India. Guess someone is till on that project. I remember when we started the project Roopa and I went to the local carpenters of Coimbatoor city to get the nest boxes made. The nest boxes were then placed at different parts of the campus and in no time they were occupied by sparrows (there is a population on campus and some in the neighboring villages). Warm and cozy nest for the babies to come were built in no time by sparrow couples. Eggs were laid and the expectant parents would get worm for the nestling.
Then I left SACON to join IISc and that was the last that I saw of breeding sparrows.
I still look around Bangalore city for sights and sounds of these birds. Birds who bring back images of my childhood. I wonder how the children today feel. Do they know how sparrows look like? Have they fed them with bread crumbs? Or is it that they too, like their parents, have locked themselves up in their AC apartments?
Sky scraping apartment complexes, spic and span, lot of space for people ............. not an inch of the roof to spare for the birds, birds we grew up with.
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?
to my terrace garden and childhood friends have gone extinct locally in many parts of India as in the rest of the world.
I have not seen a single one in and around IISc and I have asked the kids on campus to keep their eyes open.
Whoever sees one shall be generously awarded with chocolate.
Of the many hypotheses proposed for sparrow decline(including use of pesticides in farms and gardens, mobile towers, lack of granaries in city limits), decline of nesting sites was the one that sounded most serious to me. Some of the others raise concern for our own health.
In SACON we were looking at sparrow decline and monitoring parts of south India. Guess someone is till on that project. I remember when we started the project Roopa and I went to the local carpenters of Coimbatoor city to get the nest boxes made. The nest boxes were then placed at different parts of the campus and in no time they were occupied by sparrows (there is a population on campus and some in the neighboring villages). Warm and cozy nest for the babies to come were built in no time by sparrow couples. Eggs were laid and the expectant parents would get worm for the nestling.
Then I left SACON to join IISc and that was the last that I saw of breeding sparrows.
I still look around Bangalore city for sights and sounds of these birds. Birds who bring back images of my childhood. I wonder how the children today feel. Do they know how sparrows look like? Have they fed them with bread crumbs? Or is it that they too, like their parents, have locked themselves up in their AC apartments?
Sky scraping apartment complexes, spic and span, lot of space for people ............. not an inch of the roof to spare for the birds, birds we grew up with.
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?
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