I saw a little sparrow today

Today I saw a house sparrow after a long time. I don’t even remember when I saw this tiny bird in recent years which was so common a scene in my childhood days. I can very well remember watching this bird in large groups in my courtyard, roof and garden etc chirruping regularly.

I have not seen this bird for almost 15-20 years and not only house sparrow is missing but there is no sign of crow or vulture left in our surroundings. So when I saw one sparrow it reminded me of all the birds we used to see so regularly.

I tried to check about this bird on internet and came to know that there are almost 1300 species of birds available in India but we can hardly see a little over 200 in the area I live in. However, I do not remember watching any of these in the city in last couple of years.

You will be surprised to hear that we have a strange tradition of feeding 3 different animals and birds in memory of our departed loved ones in a particular week every year. The list includes crow, dog and cow and although I do not have faith in this tradition but I do for the sake of tradition.

However, I could not find any crow or any other bird I last couple of years so in most cases I keep birds share on the boundary wall of my garden and most probably the beneficiary is squirrel. I think it’s high time we do something to bring our friendly birds back.

In the process of reading about birds I read a strange news item that China has accepted its act of killing sparrow as it believed that the bird was a danger for rice production. But now the government of China feels that it was a wrong conclusion. The production of rice has gone down further after the extinction sparrow. China is trying their best to increase the number of sparrow as a friendly bird.

Image source https://pixabay.com/en/sparrow-bird-wildlife-feather-2040872/