A new method of controlling house sparrow damage to vineyards: Marginal planting of sunflowers

Abstract

Chemical pesticides used against house sparrows in areas where they cause significant damage to the quantity and quality of vineyard products can pollute the environment and harm the natural ecosystem. Sunflower seeds are a favourite food of house sparrows. The goal of this project, which lasted six years (2015-2020), was to see if marginal sunflower planting could reduce the amount of damage done to the vineyard crop by house sparrows. There was no marginal planting of sunflowers around the vineyard ('Red Raisin' cultivar) in the first three years of the experiment (2015-2017), and the sparrows damaged the vineyard crop by 32, 38, and 33 percent in 2015, 2016 and 2017, respectively. The vineyard had a large population of house sparrows at first. However, in the final three years of the experiment (2018-2020), when sunflowers were marginally planted (200 m2) around the vineyard at a distance of 50 m, crop damage by sparrow beaks was 2, 4 and 2 percent in 2018, 2019 and 2020, respectively. During these three years, the vineyard's sparrow population was low, but the marginal sunflower field's population was high. As a result, planting sunflowers in the margins of vineyards is an effective way to reduce the damage caused by house sparrows.