Squawk! Parrots are here to stay

By Petrina Gratton

High in the leafy treetops or flying overhead, thousands of screeching parrots and parakeets are taking over Los Angeles skies, invaders who are thriving thousands of miles away from their native habitat.

Now called “California wild parrots,” the burgeoning bird population has gone native. Their ancestors were trapped in the tropical forests of South America and Africa and sold here as pets before an importation ban went into effect in the 1980s – and illegally afterward.

How exactly they escaped their cages is speculation. Individual jail breaks seem likely. The 1961 Bel Air fire may have spurred homeowners to free mass numbers of beloved birds rather than see them die in flames. Some birders also credit the closing of the Busch Gardens aviary in Van Nuys with fueling their numbers. Now they are reproducing in “the wild.”

And like the other kazillion transplants in L.A., they fell in love with the California lifestyle.

Kimball Garrett, of the California Parrot Project at the Natural History Museum is Los Angeles, said “dozens of species” numbering about 5,000 have taken up residence all over Southern California.

“They’re commuters. They’re extremely social. That’s why they fly in large numbers,” Garrett said. “They fly long distances to find food yet can be very loud and heard from far. Most of them don’t cause much harm” to our local environment.

The parrots feast on exotic plant life that native birds don’t eat, such as eucalyptus seeds, magnolia blossoms, nut and fruit trees and jacarandas, Garrett said. Their only predator is man. A decade ago, there were cases where humans have shot and killed the birds in the sky, he added.

Most Angelenos are enchanted to see the neon-green, gold, and red birds perched outside their windows or flying in large groups overhead.

“I LOVE these cute little guys!!” wrote Amanda Lee Jordinelli of South Pasadena on a message board in 2014. “They are too cool, and I love looking at them and hearing them.”

But some residents complain about their raucous cackle.

“I’ll tell you what they are: unintelligent, EXTREMELY noisy, arrogant and overall completely purposeless,” squawked “Quietman” from Pasadena on the same message board. “I just want to do my work in silence and drink some coffee. But these sick, screeching, swarming infections insist on perching within 10 miles of my house. And regardless of my shut windows and the distance of the pests, I can still hear them like one is on my desk in front of me. I swear, one morning I’m going to wake at 3 a.m., grab my knife, climb that 200-foot tree, wait next to their usual squawking spot, and when one arrives, skin him, gut him and leave him to hang. May he be an example of my peace and tranquility that went amiss.”

When invasive species are introduced in a foreign environment, they can threaten the natural balance of the local ecosystem. But by and large, this has not been the case of the parrots, Garrett said.

“They have everything they need here,” he said. “We’ve brought all sorts of exotic trees and shrubs from all over the world. We’ve created a habitat for them.”

Of all the species, only the nanday parakeet in the Pacific Palisades is raising eyebrows about possibly displacing local birds. The nanday is “making inroads” into the Santa Monica Mountains, and possibly competing for nesting spots with native species, Garrett said.

“But we don’t even know if they’re impacting the environment negatively,” Garrett said. “There’s no evidence of that.”

Garrett doesn’t recommend trying to trap a California parrot because the birds are so noisy at home.

The parrots fly in groups from site to site to munch on their favorite goodies. Usually, the fly above the level of the trees.

Most L.A. transplants come for glittery lights of Hollywood and the dreams of opportunity. Few ”make it” as well as the parrot has.

Picture: Yellow-chevroned Parakeets (Brotogeris chiriri), found in small flocks in the Santa Monica area but more numerous in central and southern Los Angeles and the San Gabriel and San Fernando Valleys. Credit: Kimball Garrett/ Natural History Museum

Editor’s Note: Petrina Gratton wrote this article as an assignment for her journalism class at the Lighthouse Christian Academy of Santa Monica.