Helping Tree Sparrows

Welcome to my website, dedicated to one of my favourite little garden birds, the - Tree Sparrow.

I live at around 500', on the side of a hill, Knocklayde, surrounded by fields of sheep & close to the Causeway Coast of County Antrim, in Northern Ireland.

As a lifelong Birdwatcher I have always fed my garden birds, so imagine my delight when, around 10 years ago, I saw my first ever Tree Sparrow, on a bird feeder in my very own garden. Excited by the prospect of having them as regular visitors & with the thought that I might even be able to encourage them to breed in my garden, I immediately tried to learn more about this declining species. When I discovered a few feeding & breeding at a farm about 3 miles from my home, amongst a large flock of House Sparrows, I knew I stood a very good chance of at least seeing them again, so I formed a plan to try & encourage a return visit from them.

This site then, describes my endeavours, from feeding my birds daily, 365 days each year, to fencing off areas of our 1 acre paddock and planting out those areas with hundreds of native trees and shrubs to provide shelter & suitable habitat for insects for them to feed their young, to actually installing & maintaining nest boxes to encourage first House Sparrows to become residents, in the hope that their presence might encourage Tree Sparrows to start visiting on a regular basis, too.

I hope visitors to this site enjoy checking out my videos & photographs & that reading here of my labour of love, they may also be inspired & encouraged to provide food, shelter & nesting boxes in their own gardens, to help these delightful little birds to recover in sufficient numbers to help ensure their future survival in our countryside.

At first I settled for Nest Boxes purchased in local stores, but I found them to be rather flimsy & clearly not built to last, so I set about making my own which, although much cheaper, are much more substantial & durable when regularly maintained.

However, as my little colony of Tree Sparrows grew I found myself running out of suitable sites for additional boxes so, in desperation I hit on a plan to install lots of new ones at the top of individual posts dotted around my wildlife corners. I set up 14 x 8' posts & attached the newly constructed box to the top each in the Spring of this year, 2019 and was absolutely delighted with the results. My new free-standing boxes were an instant hit with my Tree Sparrows & not only did my population double but they actually preferred the new, larger free-standing boxes.