Iliyas Bepari doing his bit to save city’s disappearing sparrows
BELGAUM: Since the past 5 years Iliyas Bepari, on Havelock road Camp has enjoyed feeding sparrows next to his shop. Hoping to help conserve the depleting sparrow population to some extent, now about 200 odd sparrows flock the small tree and wait Iliyas to throw the feed which includes rice and also special cashew powder brought from Goa.
Iliyas Bepari in Camp Belgaum feeding the sparrows
Cashew nut powder the favorite of the Sparrows
Sparrows have been dwindling mainly due to lack of food and nesting sites. Modern buildings do not provide crevices and nooks for the sparrow to nest. Here even a couple of nests were built.
Bepari told AAB that he started to feed these birds about 5 years ago, and now its a passion and also a need. When he began hardly 5-10 sparrows were seen but now the number goes in hundreds.
The first thing Bepari does after opens his shop in the morning, is feeding the sparrows. The timings for him to feed to the sparrows are – 8 am, 11 am, 2 pm and 5 pm. He has also arranged drinking water facility for them in form of small tub.
The sparrows are so used to Iliyas that they flock together when he whistles which is a sign that their food is coming.
Iliyas is happy feeding these little ones and he is doing his bit to save these sparrows.