Italian Sparrow

this Italian cock sparrow is rather fine

chatty lot too -

The Italian sparrow Passer domesticus italiae is charged with being a hybrid between the Spanish sparrow and the House Sparrow we know and love (in Europe, OK!). They sound pretty much like the house sparrows I am used to, but in Lugano, Switzerland, the sparrows are much bolder than the timid house sparrows I know at home


later on, with a Lugano church bell at the end

Innocent Days

The air is not yet crisp and cold but you can feel the changings of the seasons. These are innocent days for the new birds of the year like this freshly minted Starling

and this Sparrow yet to moult.

They have the innocence of youth knowing only of a world which has grown kinder and more abundant. They are not yet wise to the shortening of the days and the privations of Winter. Four out of five will fall to the forest floor, not destined to see another summer day.