News

Wednesday, 20 February 2008

Food for Tree Sparrows

A site in Worthington, near Standish, has been identified where tree sparrows are still found in reasonable numbers. Suitable nesting boxes have been erected and members of the Group are providing supplementary food on a regular basis.

Tree sparrows, which nest in trees in agricultural areas, are close relatives of house sparrows which are also declining in our gardens. Tree sparrows eat seeds during the winter but change their diet to insects in the spring, summer and autumn. Until a few years ago farmers sowed cereal crops in the spring, harvested them in late summer and then left the stubble in fields until they ploughed the following spring. It was these stubble fields which provided a rich source of spilt cereal and weed seeds for the tree sparrows winter diet. Today, farmers plough almost immediately after harvest and sow a new crop in the autumn thus giving the young cereal crop a "flying start" in the spring but this denies the tree sparrows much of their winter food. It is this deficit that the feeding programme is aimed at correcting.

Spokesman for the Group, Derek Sidebotham said, "The Worthington site has trees, agricultural land, hedges for shelter and water areas which attract insects. Now that nesting boxes have been provided and supplementary feeding is in place the tree sparrows have every opportunity to thrive".

The Group is very pleased that the local farmer has cooperated with the project by permitting access to his land for the erection of the nesting boxes and to feed the birds.

Up dates will be posted as the project proceeds.

Our picture shows a tree sparrow on another site somewhere in Lancashire.