When I was a little girl growing up in Stratford in the East End of London, the soundtrack to a trip to the park was the monotone chirping of House Sparrows. They had only one call, and they used it to express everything from agitation to anger, from amorous intention to outright disdain. They hopped around my feet when I went to feed the ducks in Victoria Park, and skipped between the pigeons in Trafalgar Square. But the best place of all to see sparrows was in St James’s Park, where an elderly homeless man stood at one end of the main bridge, his outstretched hands and arms covered in the birds. Sometimes they landed on his head, or pecked seed from his beard. He reminded me a little of St Francis of Assisi, for, in addition to the sparrows, he had squirrels and various waterfowl clustered around his feet, and an audience of pigeons watching the action from the low fences that aimed to keep tourists off the lawns.
A few weeks ago, a walk in St James’s Park yielded not a single sparrow.
Sparrows are the ultimate ‘little brown jobs’. They are not brightly coloured like tits or finches, they are not melodious like blackbirds. And yet, there is a subtle beauty to their mottled wings, and much to admire in their toughness and adaptability.
Unfortunately, space is at such a premium in London that many gardens have also been disappearing under concrete, to provide parking spaces or just because people have no time to garden. In a report titled ‘London – Garden City?’, it was found that hard surfacing (which also has an impact on flooding) has increased by some 26% over the past 8 years, and ‘vegetated surfaces’ (lawns, beds and trees) have decreased by 12% in the same period. All this has an impact on the plant and insect food available for many creatures, not just sparrows.
Fortunately, some of the more enlightened councils are developing ‘sparrow-friendly’ plots in their parks and greenspaces, like the one below. There is one in Whittington Park in Archway, and the variety of annual and perennial ‘weeds’ is not only attractive but a real magnet for all kinds of pollinators, so the whole natural community benefits.
I am troubled by the decline of the sparrow. It has happened during my lifetime and, as an Eastender myself, it seems particularly sad that the ubiquitous ‘cockney sparrer’ is now, if not as rare as hen’s teeth, certainly an uncommon sight. I am much heartened, though, by the way that so many people in London (and elsewhere) are becoming aware of their impact on the environment, and are trying to do something to make recompense. People are putting out birdfeeders, growing plants for pollinators, putting up nestboxes. Is it too little, too late? Possibly. But from these little seeds, surprising things can grow. It is astonishing how much people can change things when they really want to.Shakespeare has Hamlet say that ‘there’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow’. Maybe, the fall of the sparrows of London will serve as a wake-up call for all of us.