The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/House Sparrow
HOUSE SPARROW, or ENGLISH SPARROW, the typical and most familiar sparrow of Europe (Passer domesticus), which has now become a cosmopolitan. Its original specific range cannot be determined, as from the first it has attached itself to civilized mankind, clustering about his cabins, settlements and cities, because it was naturally fearless, and still more because human occupations furnished it with an unfailing supply of food; and it spread northward and eastward as Roman civilization extended itself into the wilderness. Its hardiness, non-migratory habit and vast fecundity under the stimulation of a constant food-supply, have enabled it everywhere to thrive and to increase in numbers, until now it is probably the most numerous of any sort of land-bird in the world. Certainly it is, as a species, the most widely distributed, yet locally in the sense that it avoids uncultivated or thinly inhabited tracts. When colonies of Europeans, especially British, were formed in various countries, men missed the cheerful little companions of their paternal dooryards, and imported pairs into their new homes in India, Australia, New Zealand and elsewhere, principally from an impulse of sentiment. Meanwhile the bird had made its own way, apparently, across Asia to China and Japan.
This sparrow was introduced into the United States by the deliberate action of gentlemen connected with the Institute in Brooklyn, N. Y., and 50 pairs were set free in that city in the year 1850. Other importations speedily followed, and during the next 10 years colonies were established in Cincinnati, Saint Louis, San Francisco and other interior and western cities, on the theory that they would protect shade-trees from foliage-eating caterpillars. From these centres the adventurous sparrows spread rapidly, chiefly along the highways, “where the droppings of horses furnished an abundant supply of half-digested grain, and along the railways where the grain-cars were continually scattering food.” It is now resident in all parts of the continent, as far north as agriculture extends, but is migratory in northern Canada in the time of winter snows. Everywhere it is most numerous in cities, flocking to the rural districts somewhat in autumn, and returning to town or village during the winter.
The natural food of the species consists of seeds, supplemented by buds, fruit and similar fare in season. Caterpillars, ants and other insects are taken, but mainly as food for fledglings. Hence these sparrows have not contributed in a greater degree than do our native fringilline species to the destruction of troublesome “worms.” On the contrary they have driven from gardens, villages and city parks, by their numbers and pugnacity, many gentler kinds of native birds that were better insect-catchers. This is true especially with reference to such birds as are willing to make their homes in nesting-boxes within gardens and parks, such as martins, barn-swallows, bluebirds and wrens, which the sparrows attack incessantly, tearing their nests to pieces to get materials for their own, and seizing on their quarters. They are destructive in gardens, also, eating young plants, pecking at all kinds of fruit and plucking off buds and flowers. They make a nuisance of themselves, also, by the construction in shade and ornamental trees, and among vines over porches and walls, of their big, ragged, globular nests, entered by a hole in the side; and often place these unsightly structures on buildings, or amid architectural decorations, and at the same time befoul the buildings with their droppings, and disturb the sleeping occupants by their noisy chirping. Moreover the nests and the birds themselves harbor and distribute vermin and disease-germs.
These noxious traits far overbalance any good these foreign sparrows do, and are a heavy cost to pay for the cheer of their presence in the streets of the large cities. In many circumstances repressive action is necessary, and the government not only refuses them the protection of law, but has issued directions for killing them by wholesale; but little can be accomplished toward ridding an estate or a village of the pest except by co-operative and concerted action, steadily continued, and this is hard to obtain.
Much has been written about this subject in ornithological and agricultural literature, including several special treatises, of which the most comprehensive is by W. B. Barrows, entitled “The English Sparrow in North America,” published by the Department of Agriculture at Washington, in 1889, as Bulletin I of the Biological Survey.