Broken Home

There are 20-odd house sparrows nesting in the tall fir trees. They build big loose nests out on the long branches high up in the trees. They lack the waxeye's skill at using spider webs to stitch the nests onto the branch. Nor do they weave straw through the twigs to anchor them.

Whenever the wind is very strong the nests fly from the branches. I find the ragged bundles below the trees and anxiously search for the small opening to see if they are occupied. Mostly they are not, but sometimes I find eggs or chicks, as I did this morning.

The poor little things. Their lives had hardly begun. And the little parents have worked so hard. The cut grass they have gathered from below the trees and carried in stages to the heights. The wool comes from surrounding fields, but where did they find the many feathers that line the nest? There are no birds here that have those speckled feathers. They must have come from a distant chicken run.

House sparrows, Passer domesticus