Passer montanus (Linneo 1758)

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Passer montanus (Linneo 1758)

Stationary, bloody and in northern Italy also in transit, the tree sparrow, which
it takes its vulgar name (mattus = drunk, from Low Latin) from its behavior
strongly restless, it is a very common and widely diffused bird
throughout the peninsula and the islands, scarcer and mainly in winter in Corsica and Sardinia where, moreover, it seems to be in a phase of expansion (Brichetti, 1976) and it is also encountered in spring (Pratesi and Tassi, 1977, in addition to the notes of Martorelli, 1960).
Despite the scientific name (montanus = mountain) it is commonly present
anywhere below 1300 m. according to Brichetti (1976), even if this statement
seems to probably need a more careful check given that Moltoni (1969)
he says he met him in April along the road that leads from Bormio (d. 1217).
in Santa Caterina (d. 1734) and to have heard of the presence of this bird,
during the winter, in the hotel area of ​​Monte Ciuk (m. 1700) and Marcuzzi says it,
in his recent study on the fauna of the Dolomites (1975) «... very frequent throughout the
Primiero where it is nesting and stationary but also passing through». Probably then, but
it is only a hypothesis, in phase of expansion as far as the share is concerned.
Similar, in general structure and coloration, to P. d. italiae, it differs for the
smaller dimensions (about 14 cm instead of 15.5 or 16 cm), due to the black area on the throat and
on the upper chest which is less extensive and above all due to a clear spot in the auricular region
more or less regular crescent shape. Almost non-existent dimorphism
sexual, which is highlighted by a slightly paler color and by the spot
smaller black.
As for the domestic, anomalies are not infrequent for the tree sparrow (see
bibliogr. ) with particular reference to Isabellism (Ninni 1923, Caterini 1938, Fantin
1976) and to albinism (Zangheri 1936, Abba 1970) while in the literature I find no news
of melanic forms which on the other hand I don't think are improbable even if certainly very much
rarer. In addition to what
reported by the Authors, I recall an example «havana unicoloured
» captured by a Bolognese tensioner, called Romagnina, in the valleys around Molinella
in the winter of 1939-40 (anonymous note on no. 2-1940 of the «Rivista degli allevatori», monthly
zootechnical published by Savino) and a couple of completely white subjects currently
engaged in a reproduction experiment in Castelfranco Veneto aimed at studying the possibility
to fix the characters of the mutation. As already seen above, the tree sparrow
it hybridizes with the domestic (see also Brichetti, 1976). It seems to have populated Europe
before the House Sparrow and while in East and Central Asia actually replaces
these and also lives in the central districts of the cities, in our regions while not disdaining
the urban settlement (Sevesi 1937, Del Lungo 1937, Pratesi 1975), rightly the Cova
(1969 ) defines it «... less anthropophilic than the house sparrow...», appears above all in
margins of inhabited places, in gardens, in fields, along main roads and at the limits of
wooded areas. It reproduces from the second half of April to the end of July and perhaps even ad
August and both members of the pair build a nest similar to that of the Sparrow
domestic, in the vast majority of cases in hollow trees, in barns, in abandoned houses
and often also in nest boxes. Reported by Realini (1971) a nest with five eggs
fresh built in the foothold of a hooded crow's nest on an elm, to beyond
twenty meters above the ground, adapted and occupied by a pair of black kites, Milvus migrans
(Boddaert 1783), which had laid its eggs there.
An interesting ethological question has recently been brought to our attention
by Salvini (1977, and see also the literature cited by him) about the possible formation
for this species of families of three (one male and two females) and therefore nesting
in pairs of two females.
The wedding parade is almost similar to that of the house sparrow. They come normally
carry out two to three clutches of 4-6 eggs each (exceptionally
also 8 ) and incubation
lasts for about 13 days. After another 13 days (L. and R. Pasquali, 1976) the young
they are able to leave the nest, similar to the adults but with the auricular and gular patch of
dark gray instead of black.
It feeds on seeds of grasses and herbaceous plants; during the reproductive period
And especially in the feeding phase of the offspring, however, it is even more insectivorous than its congener
P. domesticus and devours a huge amount of insects and spiders. The parasitization of the species by the Cuckoo, indicated by Geroudet (cit.) as
occasional for Switzerland, not known for France, Belgium and Italy.
In captivity the reproduction is possible, and positive experiments in this sense are
been made in Belgium and Holland.
For Italy, the only attempt at reproduction of which I am aware concerns the one I mentioned
previously, currently in place in Veneto, to look for the possibility of creating a
strain of individuals homozygous for the albino character, similarly (at least as an aspiration
in pectore) to what has been done for the albinism of the common pheasant (Taibel, 1.935).