bird
A Sparrow In The Hand Is Worth?
I have a fondness for house sparrows (we don’t have them in the Dandenong Ranges). When my father retired, he taught a male sparrow to eat from his hand. It took months of patience. I was very impressed.
My father died suddenly.
The little bird kept turning up at the back door at the appointed time, and it broke my heart.
After a long time, the little bird stopped coming.
It has always been my wish to have the patience to repeat my father’s achievement. During MIFF this year, I went to Fed Square to eat a bread roll between movies. All the usual characters were there — lots of noise and bustle.
I found a ledge to sit on and was eyed by a seagull. I shared a bit with him and was ‘joined’ by a bunch more. Two young Chinese children and two young men speaking a language I did not recognise (I’m not good at speaking them, but I can usually recognise a wide range of languages) kept trying to frighten the birds away. While all this was going on, right next to me on the ledge were two male sparrows so close that they could easily have hopped into my pocket. I looked at them, but they didn’t seem frightened. I distracted the seagull with a bit of bread and optimistically put a crumb on the palm of my hand and slowly moved it towards them. After a few seconds, (the bird kept looking at me trying to decide the level of my character) the nearest bird jumped onto my hand and took the crumb.
I could not believe what had happened!
The two sparrows had flown off to eat the crumb, but they soon returned only this time on the other side of me where the seagulls could see them.
I performed the routine again with the same result!
There was no one to see what was happening — it was just me. I hope my dad was watching.
At this stage, I had nothing to lose, so I slowly took out my phone and tried to get a video. I was successful, so I did it again only in slo-mo, and at the exact moment the bird takes the crumb, my phone maxed out its memory!
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