Hi Eric
I am forwarding your email (sent to me as COG webmaster) to the
COG chatline in case anyone has any thoughts (Eric’s email copied below). I’m interested in your observation as I haven’t seen a sparrow in my area (Narrabundah) for many years, though they used to compete with the starlings for nest sites in our gutters.
My thought would be that sparrows are widely distributed in the settled parts of the ACT, but in low numbers, and may be increasing again after a couple of decades, and therefore or otherwise may just have decided to move into your patch. Others might have
more informed opinions.
There’s plenty of data that might give some insights:
http://canberrabirds.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/House-Sparrow.pdf
The data sheets on the website show that sparrows suffered a marked decline in the late 1980’s and have been at low levels for most of the time since then. There’s an upswing in sightings in the last few years. They also show that
Weston Creek has a slightly above average number of sparrows compared with the sub/urban Canberra average.
http://canberrabirds.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/COG_ABR2014-15FinalReportV3.pdf
The most recent Annual Bird Report says:
PASSERIDAE: house sparrow
House Sparrow Passer domesticus Common, breeding resident
Introduced species of urban and semi-urban areas.
General: Increase in the number of records from last year (77%)
and over 200% increase over 10 YA. Records from a few more grid
cells (26%) and all weeks. Reporting rate of 11.7%, exactly the
30YA. The total numbers of birds continue to rise: 3671 this year
is up 62% on last year and up 325% of 10YA. Max (down again on
previous years) 58/22 Feb JWNR (SmA1), mean 4.3, median 3.
Only 8 breeding records in 7 grids. Earliest ny/12 Oct Bredbo
GridM30 (TaN1) and last dy/3 Feb LTug (HeS1).
GBS: Increase from last year when many key indicators were down compared to past 30YAs.
Abundance (A=3.5216) is back up but still lower than the 30YA of 5.2139. Average group size up to
9.7 from 7.4 last year, max number of birds up from 60 to 95/3wk May Jerrabomberra (HaL2).
39 breeding records from 8 sites (up from 18 records and 6 sites) commencing with nb/4wk Aug
Nicholls Grid K11 (HaJ7) and concluding with dy/1wk Mar Rivett (BrT2).
Cheers
Julian
COGwebmaster
-----Original Message-----
From: Helene Anderson [m("netspeed.com.au","ehanderson");">]
Sent: Tuesday, 8 November 2016 11:18 AM
To: m("canberrabirds.org.au","cogwebmaster");">
Subject: House Sparrows
I don't know whether this is the correct approach, but after 16 years in our Stirling (Weston Creek) home, I am seeing house sparrows in our small garden and house atrium for almost the first time. The latter rarely attracts birds (it
is enclosed although open to the sky) but the sparrows seem to like it. We get a variety of native birds in the garden but until now, sparrows have been conspicuous by their absence.
I am wondering why the sudden change.
Eric Anderson
