Amsterdam: Dutch animal lovers are mourning a sparrow, shot dead after it fluttered into an exhibition hall and knocked over thousands of dominoes set up in preparation for a world record attempt.
The sparrow will be commemorated in a live Dutch television broadcast of the domino-toppling Friday after a wave of national outrage at the shooting.
"We know we are responsible for a lot of emotion in the country and we realise we couldn't go on without properly marking this," said Jeroen van Waardenberg, a spokesman for reality TV company Endemol.
An exterminator shot the sparrow in the northern city of Leeuwarden after fears the bird could upset more of the 4 million dominoes which staff had spent weeks balancing on their edges for the record attempt.
Dutch animal rights groups are outraged, especially as sparrows are a protected species in the Netherlands.
Hundreds of condolence messages have been posted on a website for the sparrow (www.dodemus.nl), which has attracted 200,000 hits.
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