The Eurasian Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus)A strange article caught my eye in today's My Paper (10/10/08, A10). This was a reference to some rather bogus sounding research in India on the cooking of an egg using radiation from handphones. Curious, I googled the thing and found that it apprarently wasn't such a new idea, 
and that some Russian journalists had not only latched on to it before, but had actually demonstrated it in a rather neat experiment. I still find it hard to believe, but it's kinda a scary especially if you are a handphone wielding egghead!
But what actually caught my eye wasn't really the hard-boiled egg, but a stray comment that these electromagnetic radiations were the cause of the extinction of the house sparrow. Now that really worried me. I had never thought about it. But you know, the common sparrow has somehow disappeared.
When I was growing up, the sparrow was the commonest bird around. Back then you pretty much wake to the sound of sparrow chirps and the sight of these sprightly little birds dancing on your window sill. But now, you can't even find one. A Nature Watch report on a 2000 bird census, showed that the the sparrow had dropped to the 7th most common position, from being the commonest according to FN Chasen's observations in 1920. Now this is really alarming....and so sad.
But apparently this is a worldwide phenomenon. The reasons for this decline in population is unknown and there are several speculations (one of which being electromagnetic radiations).
There's something really heartbreaking when some icon from your childhood disappears. And it's doubly so, when it involves a species of bird going extinct. So I was further intrigued, when I read a bit more and learnt about the efforts of some activists in Mumbai, to setup 'sparrow shelters'. Curiouser and curiouser, ...especially when I read the reference to previous pioneering work on 'sparrow shelters' in Singapore and UK, which saved the sparrows from extinction!!
Anyone know anything about this unheralded heroic pioneering work in Singapore, that saved our sparrows from extinction? Maybe we should resurrect this effort and save our sparrows once again? Come on, Singapore!
and that some Russian journalists had not only latched on to it before, but had actually demonstrated it in a rather neat experiment. I still find it hard to believe, but it's kinda a scary especially if you are a handphone wielding egghead!But what actually caught my eye wasn't really the hard-boiled egg, but a stray comment that these electromagnetic radiations were the cause of the extinction of the house sparrow. Now that really worried me. I had never thought about it. But you know, the common sparrow has somehow disappeared.
When I was growing up, the sparrow was the commonest bird around. Back then you pretty much wake to the sound of sparrow chirps and the sight of these sprightly little birds dancing on your window sill. But now, you can't even find one. A Nature Watch report on a 2000 bird census, showed that the the sparrow had dropped to the 7th most common position, from being the commonest according to FN Chasen's observations in 1920. Now this is really alarming....and so sad.
But apparently this is a worldwide phenomenon. The reasons for this decline in population is unknown and there are several speculations (one of which being electromagnetic radiations).
There's something really heartbreaking when some icon from your childhood disappears. And it's doubly so, when it involves a species of bird going extinct. So I was further intrigued, when I read a bit more and learnt about the efforts of some activists in Mumbai, to setup 'sparrow shelters'. Curiouser and curiouser, ...especially when I read the reference to previous pioneering work on 'sparrow shelters' in Singapore and UK, which saved the sparrows from extinction!!
Anyone know anything about this unheralded heroic pioneering work in Singapore, that saved our sparrows from extinction? Maybe we should resurrect this effort and save our sparrows once again? Come on, Singapore!
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