Sparrows!!!!!!

[Blue]

I'm not having a sparrow war, but I did notice that there was a bird in my newest coop a few days ago. My mom is always putting out wild bird seed in feeders for the birds, so they don't usually go into the coops. The only thing that would bother me if they started frequenting the coop would be the risk of disease and pest transmission, just as you're worried about. The chickens do free range some, too, but my chickens generally chase the birds off if any try to land in the yard while they're out free ranging.

 

[Donna A]

I love sparrows, but not in my chicken coop! I too had this issue. They were eating up my feed and leaving lice in the coop. I saw an ad for Grandpa's feeders and cringed at the price. Finally, I decided that I had to do something to resolve the problem, so I sucked it up and bought a large feeder. The chickens took to it quite readily. I had to adjust the sides some so that they had to step on the treadle to get to the food, but eventually they got over their nerves about the movement. The sparrows were gone almost immediately and the feed consumption dropped about 30 to 40 percent! The feeder has paid for itself. The device is balanced so that it will not open unless the weight of the bird is about 1.5 lbs. so it also an effective deterrent for rats.

Be warned that if you have baby chicks in the coop you will need to wire it open. I had a mother hen that was feeding her babies out of it and I lost one of the chicks when she stepped off of the treadle and the lid came down on the baby's head and neck. I still cringe when I think about it.

 

[Utah rockwood]

I first started having problems with sparrows and starlings eating the chicken feed last year and the problem just keeps getting worse as time goes on. I've pretty much taken care of the starling problem by closing up the hen house better but haven't been able to stop the sparrows and I'm wondering if some kind of trap will do the trick.

Has anyone built a sparrow trap?

I found this series of videos on youtube

showing how to build one but am wondering if anyone has done this...?

BTW, I won't kill the sparrows I catch, I will relocate them to an area far from my home.

 

[CrazyTalk]

STOP IT!!! Sparrows need to eat too! Do you realize how HARD life is for them in the wild? No sparrow war is happening here!

Most sparrows and starlings you see are European Starlings and European House Sparrows - they're invasive, and probably kill more native birds than cats do. There's nothing noble about feeding them.

 

[AlohaWaimea]

Has anyone built a sparrow trap?

I found this series of videos on youtube

showing how to build one but am wondering if anyone has done this...?

BTW, I won't kill the sparrows I catch, I will relocate them to an area far from my home.

I built that same sparrow trap back in June 2014 because sparrows were swarming our chickenʻs food and eating all too much of it. I have caught and relocated over 30 sparrows in the months since building the trap shown in that video. I drive them to a forest about 11 miles away from my home so that they donʻt come back. I keep food and water inside of the trap for the trapped sparrows so that they can eat and drink until I relocate them.

I have found that sparrows are mean birds. They sometime kill each other. Donʻt let their looks fool you. They are not nice at all. They are considered an invasive species. They will actually kill native song birds and even their chicks in the nests. If you look up bluebird and martin houses along with sparrows, you can see the damage that house sparrows (HOSP) do. They are nasty little birds!

I also had to put hardware cloth (small mesh wire) on the chicken coop itself so that the sparrows canʻt get inside of the coop. They were squeezing through the chicken wire to get inside the coop.

Here is a photo of my sparrow trap.

 

[WYNot]

So do we trap them and ship them to your home so you can feed them? Or would you prefer us to just send you the feed bills for the food they eat and the vet bills for any medical issues that might arise from their presence?

STOP IT!!! Sparrows need to eat too! Do you realize how HARD life is for them in the wild? No sparrow war is happening here! /img/smilies/somad.gif

 

[cmerk]

Thank you for all the post. We hung strips of plastic feed sacks on the poop door. For a month it worked and I almost forgot the excitement of having a small flock of sparrows fly at my head when I go in the people door. Funny how we give space to potentially dangerous species. The sparrows here have run off the Eastern Bluebirds we had and I have not seen any Chickadees or Nuthatch since the sparrows decided we had easy available feed.
I plan to look into the feeding box that the chickens have to open with their feet. We are not at war, we are protecting our chickens some of which are pets!!!
Hilltop Acres, Indiana