| Q11. Would you like to share a story about House Sparrows from this time period? | At that time i was an active kid around 10 yr old (lived there from age of 9 to 12) and since i loved all beings, i used to spent lot of time observing/helping street dogs and common birds. I lived in the first floor of a duplex opened on three sides. One of the bedroom had two windows-one each on two adjacent walls. On the beam of the third wall miscellaneous item including few boxes/catoons were kept. that place between the top of a box and ceiling was the sparrows favorite place since it was the safest possible place in the room and one of the window was very close to it. When i saw the first bird-pair building their nest by gathering little things (mainly grass).
Once, with the intention to help those little birds, I took out a piece of soft cotton out of its roll, flattened it and placed it on the window so that birds can see it. I was curious whether they will accept it for making a part of their nest or not. They did!!..... i was so happy. I did the same a few no of times and they used it for making their nest. Earlier i used to think that a bird never uses a nest prepared earlier by some other bird. But, to much of my surprise, after this pair(with family) left the nest, the same nest was used by other sparrows also. Once, I woke-up and mom said dont move. I couldnt make out what happened.. then i got to kno one of the young sparrow-kid landed over me while learning how to fly and just couldnt take off. my mom placed a hanger infront of the sparrow-junior so that it could climb over it...and the intelligent kid did. Mom carried the hanger safely on top infront of its nest and he/she reached inside safely.... we all were so happy-cant explain.
In mid of all such happy memories-I come across 1 bad memory when one kid (weakest of its siblings) dropped from the nest into the floor and died. When we saw its body in the floor.... it was heartbreaking... We put the body on a flower pot...but when i saw ants coming to its remains, i took it outside the house and buried it after digging soil... may be for the first time understood the meaning of loosing someone....but that was just a body, i know it will live forever happily. life goes on.. thanks to all those little friends... they always made me happy with their voice and they also made me understood that even at that age i could help them.. i, u & anyone can help-if they wish to... by giving some food, water, even cotton... they respect anything given with love.... and if we cant do that, then too we can help them by NOT hurting them, by NOT breaking nest, and most importantly by NOT caging them. We must also take care that if a bird make a nest inside our home and for somereason we need to go outside loacking the house, we must left open a part of window or make some arrangement so that they can get their travel path....
And yes!!.. at the end i wanna tell u what something i saw and got amazed by these little sparrows. The nest i was talking about for which i supplied some cotton. The time we were shifting from that house (also the birds were left).. while packing, those boxes/cartoons were moved (in that duration my mom never shifted those items so as to ensure their nest remains protected)... with these boxes, the nest finally moved down to us.. and their sweet home was now in my hands..... cant explain u how beautifull it was... the weaving-amazing....... and the cotton pieces - so beautifully weaved up that even on inverting the nest, they just cant dropped. I never ever expected such a brilliant use of it... much much above what i expected from them.... Although i am an engineer now but those little friends of mine are engineer by birth. I can proudly say that - I not only love them but respect them from heart... and I believe we will never let them extinct... since i know we still have few good human being left (like you reading this) who will always be their to help and support our little friends... take care.
-sonali- |
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