The sparrow who came in from the cold

Sunday, 14 December 2025

Mike White is a senior writer and columnist.

OPINION: Right now, there is a raucous chorus outside.

Oh, the sun is out, the wind is yet to rise, and all is generally still.

But through the open door comes the ceaseless sound of birdsong.

There is a lot of cheeping and chirruping, probably from demanding chicks, their bellies never satisfied.

And somewhere on high there’s something more melodious, a descant from the silver birch.

As far as aural backdrops go, it’s lovely. Busy, but happy.

It sure beats the drone of traffic, or dickwit, delinquent neighbours with thudding music and indifference to others’ tranquility.

As author and journalist Steve Braunias wrote in his wonderful book, How to Watch a Bird: “Birds, everywhere.”

Braunias made that observation after a gull swooped close by one summer evening, “a white flash against the black night”.

Here, I know there are birds, everywhere, just by listening.

Of course, we see them too.

The thrushes who seem eternally startled, as they proceed across the lawn in staccato hops.

The blackbirds who energetically rob worms from beneath the surface.

The bullying starlings with iridescent plumage, and entitled air.

Quail arrive on the fence in troops, then drop down to peck and parade.

There are the bellbirds that make your heart lift when you hear them.

And tui, whose song and thrumming wingbeat is so unique.

But, of course, the most ubiquitous are the sparrows.

Not blessed with multi-coloured flamboyance or a cocktail of tropical plumage, sparrows can easily be dismissed as dowdy. They are the pawns of the bird world: plentiful, unfashionable, dispensable.

But, as recent events have reinforced, they may be dull of cloak, but they are determined in spirit.

Earlier this year, I wrote about the uninvited lodger in our chimney.

The lodger was not only uninvited, it was an unlikeable freeloader, squatting with no intent to pay rent or provide usefulness.

It was, I discovered after much peering up at the chimney, a sparrow.

I am not an unbenevolent person. But winter was coming on, and I wanted our chimney back. I was happy to waive rent arrears, but the squatter had to pack up immediately.

On clambering on to the roof and removing the chimney’s top, I discovered an avian penthouse, lined with astonishing amounts of detritus and dried grass. It was hard not to be impressed.

It was also hard not to feel a vandal as I pulled handful after handful of the sparrow’s home from the flue, and tossed it on the driveway below.

Rendered homeless in an instant, I have no idea where the sparrow went that night, or the ever-colder ones after that.

The fire roared all winter.

It barely went out, fuelled by metres of roughly split pine.

The old dog lay within a metre of it, and dreamed contented, warm dreams.

Come late-spring, we started skipping fires, or lighting it late at night, to “take the chill off”.

Eventually, we struck a match and watched the twigs and pinecones take for the last time.

The sparrow had also been watching.

Not long after that final fire, I suspected industry on high.

The skittering of tiny claws on stainless steel flue edges. The stalks of seedy grass protruding from the chimney that couldn’t have blown up there.

God knows where the sparrow had been all winter, what frozen suffering it had endured, what hovel it had been forced to inhabit.

But it was back, and moving in once more.

Regardless of previous promises, I decided the arrangement had to end.

I lit a brief fire below to smoke out the sparrow, to send a warning that the flat in the flue wasn’t available this summer.

The next day, the sparrow was back, and back at work.

So, on went the gumboots. Out came the ladder. Up went the landlord.

Again, I was astounded by the scale of the dwelling, in such a short time.

I reached down the flue again and again and still more cylindrical nest came out .

But by now, I was seized with ruthlessness, and tossed it all below.

Out damned sparrow, out I said.

I planned to put chicken wire over the flue to make re-entry impossible, but it began to rain, so I sloped inside.

The next morning, I went outside and the sparrow was sitting on the edge of the chimney. A cluster of retrieved dried grass dangled beside it.

And in that instant, I realised I couldn’t continue defying it, couldn’t cope with the conflict and guilt.

I put the chicken wire back in its place, and turned away, humbled and humiliated.

I had been outmanoeuvred and defeated by something with a brain the size of a sultana, a head the size of a walnut - and a heart the size of a bison.

What do you think? Email sundayletters@stuff.co.nz. Please include your full name and address.