We have some miracles of nature in New York City, but we may ignore them because we see them so often. When we step outside, we will not see a glacier or volcano (I prefer it that way). Instead, we may see trees and sparrows. Sparrows are magnificent, but, because they are drab-colored, are often seen as boring little birds.
You can distinguish between male and female sparrows by their features. Males have a black stripe on their head, and females do not. If a young sparrow opens its beak, you will notice that the beak is yellow, whereas an adult’s beak is brown.
Sparrows are energetic and non-threatening birds. They will notice you. Since birds’ eyes focus sideways, a bird will tilt its head sideways to look at you.
Like humans, birds’ lives center on food and family. Sparrows are very social birds. You may hear them chattering to each other. When two birds are talking to each other, it’s usually quite easy to guess what they’re saying. For example, when a young bird approaches an adult bird and wiggles its wings, it’s asking a parent for food. When more than two birds are talking to each other, it may be more difficult to figure out what is going on. It’s the same with foreign languages for humans: it’s much easier to understand a conversation between two people than to understand a conversation between many people.
For sparrows, the house is very important. In New York, many sparrows build their nests in the horizontal pole attached to most street corner traffic lights. In spring, a male sparrow will stand outside the pole chirping loudly, perhaps boasting about the real estate that he has obtained. Then you may see birds gathering nesting materials and flying to their home. Later, you may hear young sparrows chirping form inside the pole, or see busy parents flying to the nest.
Sparrows raise two or three clutches each year. You can tell when a new clutch is growing. At some traffic lights, parents are busy bringing food to the nest, as baby birds chirp demandingly. On the sidewalks, some young birds who have left the nest follow their parents around, demanding food. The parents do not seem eager to feed them. The parents step away from their children – if the parents wanted to avoid the children, the parents would fly away, but they do not. The babies and older juveniles seem to be less afraid of humans. Sometimes the youngsters learn that they get more attention when they remain in a dangerous spot. Parents, to their regret, accidentally teach the children to beg for food from the sidewalk.
In the winter, sparrows seem to sit and chat in bushes, perhaps unaware that they are visible because all the bushes’ leaves have gone. It’s impossible to guess what they are discussing because they don’t move (it’s too cold).
So next time you see a sparrow, appreciate this high energy charming little bird. If you watch it, you may start to understand its language and culture.