Java Sparrow Status in USA (1 Viewer)

[TwoDipsfromAmsterdam]

On my recent trip to Georgia (see http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=140962) I found a Java Sparrow in Savannah. According to Sibley it's an escapee found in Florida. Obviously Savannah is not that far from Florida so two questions:

Have they established a breeding population in the south-east?

Have they spread much beyond Florida?

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DiP

 

[Richard Klim]

Ref. Bill Pranty 2004. Trash Birds: Florida's Exotic Avifauna - A Preliminary Checklist. Birding 36(4): 362-372:

"A population of Java Sparrows (native to islands of Oceania) was found at Coral Gables around 1960 and numbered up to 150 individuals in 1968-1969 (Owre 1973). However, this population was extirpated by 1977 (Stevenson and Anderson 1994). Java Sparrows no longer can be imported into the U.S. (James 1997), although they are found in aviculture. Escapees, including white avicultural morphs, are frequently reported in Florida, but they do not persist. This individual [photograph: Cocoa Beach, Florida; November 2000] was one of two that built a nest in the gutter of a house, but both disappeared within three weeks."​

Richard

 

[lmans66]

Hmm...news to me. I thought they were Pacific Islanders myself.....surely a species brought in. Are they the same in appearance in Florida?

 

[Richard Klim]

... A population of Java Sparrows (native to islands of Oceania)...

I thought they were Pacific Islanders myself.....surely a species brought in. Are they the same in appearance in Florida?

'Oceania' = Pacific Islands & Australasia. FL birds are indeed introductions (escaped exotic cagebirds).

Richard

 

[njlarsen]

Puerto Rico is, as far as I can tell, a part of the US (well to some extent at least), and you may be interested to know that a population seems to be stable in the San Juan area.

Niels