Are you back from all your Christmas and New Year travelling? Haven't had enough? Are you looking for some more travel places? Or, is travel to odd places one of your New Year resolutions?

If you are waiting for the call of the wild and love bird watching, travel to the home of sparrows.

Advertisement

A village up in Uttarakhand is home to many birds of high altitude. Recently, the village – Mukkumath, launched a unique campaign to provide permanent homes to house sparrows. The hallmark of the movement is not placing potable sparrow nests (made of wood) in home, but to create permanent rooms for the birds in their concrete structure.

The natives of Mukkumath village in district Ruderprayag have started this noble effort. Inspired by the move of bird watching guide Yashpal Negi, who created two dozen nest in his home, many other villagers have joined  hands in sparrow conservation. Under it any villager making new building is motivated to create  small boxes of 4X4 inch inside the wall- with a small hole for entry-exit of the bird.

Currently, eight families of the village have created 76 nests in their homes and many other doing new construction are showing interest in making fixed dwelling place for sparrows.

Bird watching guide Yashpal Negi says, “In the old buildings, constructed in the traditional style, there was a place for sparrows. The birds used to make their nest in the rafters and other place inside the roof. But, the modern cement houses offers no space for sparrow to dwell. So, I made the experiment of making permanent homes for birds in my new house. The idea clicked and now other are adopting it.”

Mukkumath is home to 300 families. The village become home of many birds of high altitude in the winters. Birds from Tungnath, located at an altitude of 3,680 Mts,  and its neighbouring area come for the winter stay. Presently the village is vibrant with activities of Golden Bush Robin, Himalayan Bluetail, Redstart, Scaly Breasted Wren Babbler, etc.

The nestling season of house sparrow starts from March to conclude in June. Local resident Shrichand Singh Rawat said, “I have created six sparrow nests in my recently constructed home. Our family is happy that we are doing something for sparrow conservation.”

Rawat family is among the eight odd families that have decided to provide dedicated space to sparrows in their newly constructed homes. The Mukkumath village experiment should inspire bird lovers to follow in their footmarks for conservation of house sparrows.