I used to get House Sparrows in my garden. Used to, but no longer!
A few years back I read an article in my quarterly RSPB magazine
which discussed reasons for the decline of House Sparrows in the UK...
and a poem, some of which stuck in my head...
The inevitable resultant song made it onto m' band's latest CD 'All Rogues & Villains'
- and then we heard their numbers were on the up again!

Spadge (D.McFarlane)

There were those I knew never had a song
From clad-ivy walls & eave they would raise their young
Puddle-fluttering fun, after dust bath play
They'd fall on grain we'd spill in our working day.

(Chorus)
Old friends, once so familiar, so close to everyone
Where have they gone? Where have they gone?
The widespread, once abundant - it seems their time has flown
What have we done? What have we done?

Not so long ago - In the ripening corn
They'd rise up ahead in flocks as you walked along
From the town-crowd pave or the midden high
In a swirling, chattering throng they'd pass you by (Ch)

'Tween the new sew-stacks and the old mill door
Where once new-threshed we'd drag the sheaves of straw
From the paddock *fank to the urban sprawl
From wood to city street can you hear them call? (Ch)


*fank - sheep pen/enclosure
Some of the old names for 'sparrow'.....
(England) spadge, spadger, spug, spuggy, sprog, spadgick
(Orkney) sprog, speug, sparrag, sporrow;
(Shetland) spuggie, sparky, spjugg, sporra, sporrow; (Middle English) sprewe;
(Old English) sparwa, spearwa

More details.....
on the songs page here
- will try and put a sample of the song on that website, mebbe tomorrow if time allows.