For several years now Sally and I have been trying to encourage house sparrows to nest in our garden. We now have 7 house sparrow nest boxes on the front of our house and 3 more in trees in the back garden. As well as winter feeding we also provide supplementary feeding in the nesting season by providing live mealworms. House sparrows love them ( so do blackbirds, robins and starlings! Live insect food is very important for the development of young birds. Last year we had at least 15 successful house sparrow broods and we hope that 2014 will be just as good. Good for house sparrows and good for us!
As usual Sally has been trying to film what the sparrows are doing. Try looking at these videos – sparrows bathing in our pond, collecting feathers from an old pillow for nesting material, starlings, blackbirds and sparrows waiting for food and a fledgling house sparrow being fed. Not quite Springwatch standard but nice to see – she keeps saying that she will learn how to edit videos but she never does.
Malcolm