If a Sparrow Should Fall

In this piece by AP writer Toby Sterling, a murdered House sparrow gets honorary internment in the Rotterdam Natural History Museum. After finding its way into an exposition hall, where for months volunteers took pains to set up millions of dominoes (4,002,136 tiles and a Guinness World Record if confirmed), the bird began toppling pieces and threatening the project. Organizers called an exterminator to eliminate the threat, which was promptly done with an air rifle (model and caliber not mentioned).

The sparrow's execution sparked controversy among the Dutch: Was it justified? Was it legal?

Evidently not.

Even though House sparrows (Passer domesticus) are still common in the Netherlands, according to the article the specie was placed last year on that country's endangered list. The listing comes in recognition of a 50% decline in its abundance in recent decades. A similar finding, not mentioned in Sterling's piece, is the House sparrow's marked decline in the British Isles, ironic since the bird's most familiar name here is the "English sparrow."

So the carcass of the sparrow was seized by Dutch authorities and the exterminator fined by public prosecutors at The Hague. The stuffed (or pickled, they haven't decided) sparrow will now be placed in a museum, perched for eternity on a box of dominoes.

Whether this story is funny or not might be debated. But it hits some of Querencia's favorite topics (animals, government, weird hobbies, to name a few) and I submit it for your consideration.

But this line I found genuinely amusing. Note the reason given for the decline of the domestic sparrow(!): "Although common, the house sparrow's numbers have fallen by more than 50 percent in the past 20 years due to human encroachment on their habitat."

There has to be another reason...