Barbara Yandle, Age 16, Of Charlotte, N.C., For Her Question:

Is the English sparrow from England?

North America is home to some 90 species of sparrow. They are dainty little flutterers with short, sturdy bills suitable for crushing seeds. Our native sparrows enjoy life in the fields and wild woods, and many of them are sweet songsters. In character, as everyone knows, the so called English sparrow is very different from these shy little charmers.

The truth of the matter is that the English sparrow, alias the house sparrow, is not really a true sparrow. What's more, this grubby, grimy, scrappy little rowdy is not especially British. His ancestors for ages have pestered the people of many European countries and made life miserab1e there for many of the native birds. Until about 1850 the new world managed to get along very well  thank you  without this delinquent of the bird world.

We are not surf from which country in Europe or asia he emigrated. It may or may not have been from England. He was imported by some american who did not know all he should have known about the world of nature. However, this busybody thought he had a good idea. The american fields and orchards were being attacked by hungry, leaf eating cankerworm caterpilllars, and, it was thought, the little toughie from the old world. Would eat up these nev world pests and save our crops and trees but as a pest controller the false sparrow with the false pedigree was a failure.  Like our true sparrows, he eats weed seeds. However, once established here he adde wheat, oats and other items of our grain foods to his diet. He eats a few insects, but he stubbornly refuses to eat the pesky cankerworms he was expected to devour.

He resembles our native sparrows in size and build. Like them, he wears plumage striped with brown and tan, black and white. But in character and living habits he is vastly different from our charming songsters of the woods and meadows. He 1ives and nests in built up areas where he loins a gang of his tough and rowdy relatives to drive off many more desirable birds. The quarrelsome character hates to have other birds around and does his best to discourage them.

The true sparrows would disown him and so might his own family, the weaverbirds. The well mannered weaverbirds of the tropics are famous for their neat and elaborate nests. The nest of the so called English sparrow is a sloppy, untidy affair. The sorry character, it seems, had learned no good habits from either the sparrow family, to which he claims to belong, or from the weaverbird family, to which he really does belong.

Mrs. House sparrow has several broods each year, which means the little pests multiply at a great rate. They have spread all over the United States and into parts of Canada and Mexico. The little toughies do not migrate with the seasons and, hence, are around to pester their neighbors through the spring and summer, fall and winter.