I know the House Sparrow is supposed to be in decline, but over the past month or so i’ve been spotting a lot more of them and in bigger collective numbers, 😀 anyone else agree?

Got loads in our garden. Attracted the attention of the local sparrowhawk last year.

Yes, definitely. I’ve seen loads this year and last, from Northumberland to Cornwall.

There’s a big RSPB effort to encourage them – they helped us to set up some special sparrow feeding areas in our park, planting lots of meadow plants near hedgerows.

Where I’ve been elsewhere in the world that the British colonised (New Zealand and Hawaii) they’ve been in abundance, pests in fact. Catch a few there and bring them back?

On another bird related note, can you cull seagulls? Well I know ‘seagulls’ don’t exist but the gulls that appear to be in abundance (especially where school children buy their lunch from)

In the last few months they bred and fledged. It will be winter that limits the numbers

On another bird related note, can you cull seagulls? Well I know ‘seagulls’ don’t exist but the gulls that appear to be in abundance (especially where school children buy their lunch from)

Definitely not – ironically given their urban pest status, they’re endangered, particularly the herring gull which is usually the more menacing variety. They’re only coming inland and scavenging because we’ve destroyed their normal food sources of coastal fish…

RSPB info

Yes. Definitely seeing greater numbers recently. Back in position on the guttering and chirruping away. Great to see.

My Pyracantha is alive with spuggies

We’ve got loads living in the back wall of our house.

We’ve had them nesting and fledging around us for a few months it seems. Regularly see the adults teaching the newly fledged sparrows what a bird feeder is for 😀

On another bird related note, can you cull seagulls? Well I know ‘seagulls’ don’t exist but the gulls that appear to be in abundance (especially where school children buy their lunch from)

It would be easier to cull the schoolchildren who are making the mess? 😉

(I live in a seaside town, no problems with gulls around here, other than tourists being afraid for their ice-creams. A problem which I’ve never had, for gluttonous reasons. However, a recent trip to Plymouth and fish and chips on the seafront was amusing. So many people being hassled by birds, and all the birds were doing was staring, then waddling towards the chip-eaters…)

Loads in our wildflower meadow at the moment, stripping seeds in great flocks.