I'll "fess up" - when I was about ten years old my brother and I rescued
an unfledged house sparrow. We raised it and released it into the wild.
It was apparently one tough little guy, because since no one in my family
knew anything about birds, we were a little unorthodox in our feeding
attempts. I remember tenderly feeding it eye-droppers full of warm milk
along with oatmeal and hamburger. Having survived our clumsy, uneducated
attempts to save its life, it was killed by a cat within a week of its
release. Raising that "trash bird" was the experience that turned me on
to watching birds. (It was also great fun to watch our goofy Irish setter
snap into a point whenever she came across it). My cats are all house
cats, but I still evict the house sparrows from my four nest boxes every
spring in a mostly successful attempt to provide nesting space for
swallows and chickadees. I'm a total amateur at birding, but I don't have
to tell you tweeters how enjoyable I find it whenever and wherever I can
make time for it. The right close encounter with even a trash bird can
hook you for life!

--Cindy Blanding, ctb at u.washington.edu 206.543-1899
IBS, University of Washington Libraries
FM-25, Seattle, Washington 98195


On Monday 23 Oct 1995 Michael R. Smith wrote:

> How about it tweets, fess up - any of you ever 'had' a starling
> or house sparrow? I know one who has had the latter as a pet. Hmmmm,
> I'm certainly going off on a tangent, aren't I?