Italian Sparrows
The Italian Sparrows in Rome are dwarfed by the feral Pigeons:
![Italian Sparrows - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Italian-Sparrows-The-Hall-of-Einar-0422.jpg)
The males are incredibly handsome birds, with glorious colours on their heads and back.
![Italian Sparrows - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Italian-Sparrows-The-Hall-of-Einar-0479.jpg)
They are different from the House Sparrow found in the UK. Italian Sparrows don’t have the grey head:
House Sparrow – forty years ago in my nature notebooks
They flutter in confident small flocks on the Roman stone roads. The females are more subtle in their plumage:
![Italian Sparrows - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Italian-Sparrows-The-Hall-of-Einar-0323.jpg)
They are alive to any possibility of a crumb:
![Italian Sparrows - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Italian-Sparrows-The-Hall-of-Einar-0403.jpg)
But most of what they find isn’t food:
![Italian Sparrows - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Italian-Sparrows-The-Hall-of-Einar-0435.jpg)