In Chennai, there are known facts about the house sparrow (passer domesticus) — some that sparrow-watchers want to stop their ears against; and some others they would want to have on a 24-hour loop. With much of the discussion about the species lying in the largely murky zone of wistful longing and pollyannaish optimism, let us focus on the latter. Let us gloat over these positive facts, in the company of sparrow-lovers, and in the process also send sparrow-neophytes on a tour of discovery.
They are about localities in the fast-thumping heart of Chennai that have stubbornly latched on to their house sparrow populations. The contrary is probably truer. The chirps of the house sparrow are not getting feeble despite the growing din of urbanisation in these parts.
Gnanaskandan Kesavabharathi, eBird reviewer who studies data about birds in the Chennai region, points out that South West Boag Road and Second Main Road, CIT Nagar, support healthy house sparrow populations.
“Both these roads have two rice mandis, and many house sparrows are to be found right next to these stores,” says Ganaskandan.
Here is naming a few other spots that promise a sure-fire sparrow sighting any season of the year and have always delivered on the promise — Srinivasapuram in Foreshore Estate; South Mada Street around the Parthasarathy temple in Triplicane; Byndiamman Koil Street in Besant Nagar; the houses around what birders call Ramnagar Swamps in Madipakkam; a bustling business section of Kanathur on East Coast Road; Pathu Muthu Ammal Street in Netaji Nagar, Perumbakkam; Kuppam Beach Road in Kottivakkam Kuppam.
The list is hardly exhaustive, but these busy patches do present a reliable picture of what makes sparrows want to keep tripping over your doormat.
Much of the sparrow population in Srinivasapuram is concentrated around a small housing-board colony with 24 flats, largely dilapidated but occupied. A handful of residents spare rice for these birds, but the majority do not. However, it is not the feeding or the lack of it that is influencing these sparrows’ decisions about this patch. Given their numbers and their uninhibited movements and activities — the house sparrows mud-bathe to glory in this patch — underline the other favourable factors present there for everyone to see.
There are a handful of moringa oleifera trees, and the house sparrows make the most of them as roosting stands. There are jasminum auriculatim climbers in one section, but on the morning of March 19, 2022, they looked thin, sparse of leaves. During an earlier visit, a couple of years earlier, this writer had noticed sparrows making themselves cosy in the dense growth of these jasmine climbers.
This pattern can be seen on South Mada Street in Triplicane where at least a couple of residents have got Jasmine climbers to go up the facades of their homes. In fact, the house sparrows also roost in massive numbers on a mimusops elengi tree found in the Parthasarathy temple.
In all those places mentioned above for enthusiastically hosting sparrows, various combination of these factors would be at play.
Ornithologist V Santharam notes that house sparrows are big on community roosting, and plants and trees that would facilitate it receive a massive plus in their assessment book. Certain trees, climbers and shrubs that would harbour worms are just what the doctor ordered for house sparrows planning a family. The young of the house sparrows are entirely reliant on an insect-based diet, particularly worms, offered by their parents.
Santharam draws attention to a study in the United Kingdom that noted a drastic drop in house-sparrow populations in a borough where the greenery had been hugely treated to pesticides, robbing it of its tenants: insects and worms. And the young house sparrows, of their dinner.
