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Parrots Are Taking Over the World
Scientific American ^

Posted on 06/14/2023 1:29:56 PM PDT by FarCenter

At Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery the living get as much attention as the dead. Groundskeepers maintain the 478-acre historic landmark as an arboretum and habitat for more than 200 breeding and migratory bird species. But many visiting wildlife lovers aren't interested in those native birds. They're at the entryway, their binoculars trained on the spire atop its Gothic Revival arches. They've come to see the parrots.

The urban cemetery hosts dozens of long-tailed, dove-size parrots, lime green with gray accents on their foreheads and chests, called Monk Parakeets. (Parrots and parakeets are part of the same family.) These birds maintain barrel-size stick nests not just at this cemetery but across the city. They live in nearby Connecticut, too. Monk Parakeets and other species of parrots are in Chicago, Miami, Tampa, New Orleans, Los Angeles, Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and Austin. Red-masked Parakeets live on Telegraph Hill in San Francisco. Rosy-faced Lovebirds decorate the palm trees of Phoenix. Parrots are present in all of Mexico's 10 largest cities, as well as Barcelona, Amsterdam, Brussels, Rome and Athens. They're in Tel Aviv. And Singapore. All around the world, parrots are taking over with a resounding SQUAWK!!!

Today at least 60 of the world's 380 or so parrot species have a breeding population in a country outside their natural geographical range. Each successful transplant has its own story: some are benign, others a threat to the local wildlife; some are abundant in their home ranges, whereas others rely on cities as a refuge from extinction. All are by-products of the pet trade and animal trafficking around the world. Because they're parrots, they're smart, adaptable, creative and loud. “They're animals that are really social, and they live in cognitively complex social environments,” says Grace Smith-Vidaurre, a postdoctoral fellow at the Rockefeller University and the University of Cincinnati, who studies the birds. “They're like humans in a lot of ways.”


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: birds; monkparakeets; parrots; quakers
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To: mabarker1

LOL!


41 posted on 06/15/2023 3:11:32 PM PDT by SkyDancer (One Day For Our Flag A Whole Month For The Pride Flag - Think About That!)
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To: SkyDancer

🦜🤪From the mind of Super Chicken.


42 posted on 06/15/2023 5:18:15 PM PDT by mabarker1 ( (Congress- the opposite of PROGRESS!!! A fraud, a hypocrite, a liar. I'm a member of Congress!!!)
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To: Ezekiel

“Polly” means many.”

Now that’s a phrase worth parroting.


43 posted on 06/15/2023 7:53:00 PM PDT by Rennes Templar (Come back, President Trump.)
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To: Rennes Templar

Thanks. I crackerd up!

Nothing like a little Greek to start the day.

Did you know that in Greek, a parrot is a “παπαγάλος” — “Papa Galos”?

How awesome is that? The first one to open a pizza joint really has got it made. So easy.


44 posted on 06/16/2023 2:58:03 AM PDT by Ezekiel (🆘️ "Come fly with US". Ingenuity -- because the Son of David begins with Mars ♂️, aka every man)
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