A survey of birds conducted by the Avian Diversity and Bioacoustics laboratory of the Gurukul Kangri University (GKU) during the past seven years indicates a drastic decline in the population of house sparrow in different urbanised and suburbanised areas of Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh.
To ensure sparrow conservation, a week-long programme has been launched by the department of Zoology and Environmental Science of GKU which would include speeches, posters and essay contests. The drive was launched by the Mela officials at GKU on Tuesday. The Nagar Nigam officials have assured full commitment in spreading the awareness towards conservation of sparrow.
According to the internationally known bird biologist Professor Dinesh Bhatt, about 35—45 per cent decline was observed in the population of house sparrow in a number of towns, including Garhmukteshwar, Yamuna Nagar, Roorkee, Haridwar, Dehradun, Kotdwar, Pant Nagar, Haldwani, Udhamsingh Nagar while the population of house sparrow is still thriving well in suburban areas of the hilly regions of Nainital, Almora, Pauri, Srinagar, Rudraprayag, Guptkashi, Gaurikund and Joshimath. There is need to conserve sparrow in these areas.
Speaking on the occasion, Mela Adhikari S A Murugesan said, “We will try to connect all the visitors of the Ardh Kumbh mela with this conservation drive. Through pamphlets, flex boards message shall be spread to keep nests in homes for the sparrows to breed.”
Mukhya Nagar Adhikari Vipra Trivedi also assured assistance on behalf of Nagar Nigam towards the conservation drive. The vice -chancellor of the university Surendra Kumar lauded the efforts of professor Dinesh Bhatt towards the conservation of house sparrow. Research scholar Vinay Sethi gave wooden sparrow nets to the officials to be hung outside the offices. The final day programme would include poster competition and interactive session at ITC. Hall in Saharanpur on 20 March.
Speaking to The Pioneer, Dinesh Bhatt said, “The sparrow had been flourishing alongside human settlements almost all over the world since the past over 10,000 years when agriculture started. last few years’ reports have indicated that house sparrow, which was nearly cosmopolitan in distribution around the globe, is declining worldwide at an alarming state. Overall 14.2 per cent cumulative decline was observed in different landscapes during the study period and maximum decline of 35.28 per cent was observed in the urbanised area as compared to rural habitat where it was 12.65 per cent.”
According to the study by the university, the primary cause of the decline of house sparrow appears to be the lack of appropriate nesting sites due to use of modern architecture in the construction of houses now —a—days.
In modern houses there is almost absence of the open ventilators which restricts the movement of the house sparrow within the houses. In turn, this species has to suffer from the lack of nesting sites which leads to a sharp decline in the population of the house sparrow. In contrast, the ancient traditional houses were built of wooden and bamboo works having enough space for birds to build the nest, the study says.