A Twitter photo of a modern nest neighborhood ruffles some feathers online.
The Internet loves animals. You can barely shake a stick in cyberspace without finding a cute cat video (sometimes featuring surprising cameos) or a new line of puppy apparel. But let’s not neglect the unsung hero of the skies here: birds have viral potential too!
Imagine that you’re a bird. After a long day of buying tickets at a train station or posing for an art print, chances are you want to tuck yourself away for the night and catch some shut-eye. Unfortunately, what with the economy in the state that it is… well, money just can’t buy the same classy two-branch family nest that it used to.
▼ Building a nest in the eaves of a house? So gauche.
Sparrow aficionado @MausMagica shared a great snap of the latest in apartment complexes for little birds. Just zoom in a little closer… No, closer than that…
Snug and cozy, right? Keeps you away from predators, and easy to hop over to your neighbor’s hole to borrow a cup of worms.
▼ Plus, you’ll get way more natural sunlight than this old thing!
Once the internet’s cries of ‘CUTE!!!’ had died down some, an anonymous commenter highlighted a severe design flaw in these sparrows’ new digs, asking “Hey, doesn’t water come out of those holes when it rains…?” Another commenter fired back, though, with “Those are way too big to be drainage holes!”
This lead to some impassioned enquiries about what those little holes in the wall actually are. Thankfully some trusty internet specialists showed up to explain the holes are for diverting water through concrete if it rains. With a concrete wall, the rainwater can build up around it (as water can’t pass through solid concrete). Pressure rises and there’s a chance the wall will get destroyed.
Even so, the people were not sated with this explanation.
“What happens to the sparrows when it rains, then?!”
“Just put a mesh cover over the holes and they’ll be fine.”
“Oh no I just imagined it… too grim (but really funny).”
Others pointed out that since they can fly, sparrows have a built-in emergency getaway system. Hopefully our bird friends can blast off quickly before they wind up looking like this.
The thread quickly dissolved into berating a user for calling the birds ‘chicks’ when they’re clearly sparrows, but everyone came together to coo over lots of cute bird photos like the one above. Another grave issue solved by cute animal photography!
I’m still wondering what’s going on with this commenter, though.
“See the two sparrows in one hole, in the bottom right? There’s always gotta be a couple amongst all the single guys, showing everyone up. I can’t stop thinking about it.”
Maybe this guy should stop spending so much time on bird pictures and go protest Christmas, or something.
Featured image: Twitter/@MausMagica
Source: Twitter/@MausMagica, Kinisoku
Top image: Wikimedia Commons/Yiwenyiwen
Insert images: Wikimedia Commons/Koba=chan, Wikimedia Commons/OlafM
