Who has a house sparrow colony?

we have a large colony of sparrows living near us , i encourage them in the garden with the food , they are quite entertaining . at night i can hear at least 30 or more down the road settling down for the night in some bushes , and there are some next door under eaves of a shed

KatTai said:

Who has a colony of house sparrow and are they a "natural" colony under the eves or did you encourage them using a nest box?

My aunt has a colony of house sparrows under the eves of her roof, they were there when she moved into the house and after she started feeding them they really seemed to thrive with a good few fledglings appearing this year (she tried offering livefood but they weren't interested - the adults simply ate the seeds and then went to the hedges and trees to search for insects).  I think there are around 6-10 breeding pairs but it is hard to tell just how many there are and they are all at the end of the house in a small area.  And of course will have to wait and see how well they make it through the winter!

My Sparrows are becoming more used to me at feed times now.

It is funny when I walk out of the front door, and they all pop out of the bush at once to see if any food is coming their way.

If I walk along the road and to the shops, they watch me walking along the road away from the house.

On my way way back to the house all I see is the chirping sillouettes of 12 sparrows sitting on the top most of the top most branches of the bush.  They love to survey and watch my return once more.

Very cute.

Regards

Kathy and Dave

My litle cuties are still behaving oddly. They are defiantly refusing to eat seed from any of the feeders in the garden, prefering the seed on the ground. There are still about 30 or more, as noisy as ever, and in the garden much of the day, but not where they should be!!

Like you story about your Sparrows, Blackbird :o)  I too have had that experience with mine, I was out there this morning cleaning their feeders and I had 20 little faces looking at me from the tree, exchanging a few chirps in a "what is he doing?  Is it food?"  sort of way.

They're not quite back to being an all day regular as they were - the still have a liking for the neighbour's bread and we all know what Sparrows are like, if one goes they all go!

Sparrow - that's funny about yours how they've taken to eating off the floor. Especially since I have found that they aren't overly keen on that here.  Hope they return to normal soon :o)

We have about five or six nesting pairs in the walls of the house and one nest-cam equipped box.

Last year the parents raised three clutches. Not bad for Cumbria.

They roost in the neighbours large fir tree and rhododendrons in large numbers and are a joy to watch as they chirrup,and squabble around the bird feeders. Last year it was so funny watching them cram four, five, six and more live mealworms into their beaks during nesting time. The blue tits happily shared. They build a rather untidy deep nest in contrast to the blue tits' tidy moss lined affair.

Hello Dangerous, and welcome to the forum.

It is great to be able to welcome another sparrow lover, and I look forward to hearing about your colony - and some photos?

I have a colony in two large conifers in a garden backing on to mine.  They were coming on mass when they had fledgelings, but now come in dribs and drabs.( about 8 at a time) They eat seed both from the feeders and on the ground. 

There always seems to be a forerunner that checks whats about prior to the rest arriving.  I am hoping they will continue to visit as they were my very first visitors after putting up the feeders.

Oh dear Paul, are they still misbehaving?

Mine always used to eat a premium seed mix, but chucked out the black rape seed. They had this in two feeders. One is a Chinese lantern cage feeder with a handy tray inside the cage where they sat. I used to fill this up to the top every day. The other is a flat mesh tray attached to the fence, and I filled this up several times, although the other birds also used this one.

Since the snow before Christmas, they have totally abandoned the Chinese lantern. I have changed the food to sunflower hearts, but still untouched. They also abandoned the mesh tray, and ate soley on the ground.

Very recently, some have drifted back to the mesh tray, which has my own mix in it. (suet pellets, mealworms, peanut granules, sunflower hearts, premium mixed seed) The starlings get most of the suet and mealworms. I don't know what the sparrows are eating from this mix, but I did try adding safflower seed and it all gets tossed out.

I often see them on the ground with a pink berry suet pellet in their beaks, looking very proud of themselves, but these are the ones spilt by the starlings, and they do eat dried mealworms if they get half a chance. I scatter these under the feeders for the blackbirds, but the sparrows find them.

They also abandoned the peanut feeder and fat ball feeder before the snow. However, one or two are now drifting back to these. I have also seen the unfaithful blighters next door on his peanuts and fat balls.