I may not have realized it at first, but the fact that a House Sparrow pecked at one of thelemon cookies that I threw on the street made me wonder. Perhaps the House Sparrow was just unable to bite into the cookie. I then decided going back to the neighborhood I was at before, but instead of just throwing individual cookies on the ground, why don’t I try crumbling them up instead? So I did just that. So I had about half of a box of the lemon cookies, and I also had shortbread ones as well. I brought a piece of bread with me just in case. I took a piece of each and started crumbling each one and threw it at 4 places throughout the neighborhood I was at before. About 10 minutes later, I started to walk back to the other 3 places that I dropped the pieces at, and I saw 1, 2, and even 3 House Sparrows grabbing at all those crumbs. The bread pieces were gone before I even got back there. I then went across the street where there were several House Sparrows and once I threw a piece of another cookie, 2 House Sparrows came at it, including a crow, which took off with the piece once the other House Sparrow dropped it. I also went further down the road and I used up my last lemon crumb I had. I started to use the box of shortbread cookies. I threw the pieces of shortbread and bread pieces where another 3 House Sparrows were at. They flew away once I got 15 feet from them, and I waited for 5 minutes and they still didn’t come. I just got a flat tire at the time, so I needed to stay there anyways to fix it. Once I rode a little while and turned around, those 3 House Sparrows were at the cookies. One of the House Sparrows was still there when I got closer to it. It flew off with the piece in its beak once another person started walking on that sidewalk. I then turned onto a road where a church was, and across the street, there were 7 or 8 House Sparrows looking for insects in a parking lot. I threw a piece of bread toward one that was perched on a telephone wire. It swooped down and stuffed its beak with the bread. It didn’t seem as interested in the piece of shortbread cookie that was beside it, but another House Sparrow that was nearby grabbed it and flew off. Then, I took a few more pieces of the cookies and the same thing happened. There was maybe at least 1 of those sparrows that managed to see me throw the pieces of the cookie.
Here’s the concept, the House Sparrows may have mistook the cookie for a rock or something since they couldn’t break into it with their beaks. That means, the only way those House Sparrows were going to eat those cookies is if someone were to have walked into it, or the weather managed to break them down. I’m sure within the 2 days those cookies have been sitting out, either situation could have happened. I had to realize that they eat “table scraps”, not entire meal portions! Now it seems that they’ll eat anything as long as it is in crumbs. Dang, that House Sparrow was just unable to eat that cookie a couple of days ago because the cookie was too large to bite into. Who would have known?
Here’s my YouTube video that shows a House Sparrow grabbing a cookie crumb and flying off with it at the end.