Review author: “ZooVita”
Parrots are the most common birds that are used by humans not for hunting, but only for decorative purposes. The names of parrots are as varied as their appearance.
Living in tropical countries, these unusual birds are divided into more than three hundred species. There are species of talking parrots that can repeat heard sounds and even human speech.
Appearance and structure
Descriptions of parrots of different species vary extremely. Their length can range from 9.5 centimeters to one meter. The bird has a great variety of feather color options. The colors of parrots are very bright, and the colored areas are sharply demarcated. Basically the predominant color is green. Juveniles of the same species are, in most cases, identical in color.
The most outstanding feature of parrots is their beak. Its height is twice its width, and often its length. With the help of their unique beak, parrots can not only break hard fruits, but also use it to climb trees, clinging to branches, while actually replacing the bird’s third leg.
The bird's legs, short, thick and with feathers reaching to the heels, are used by parrots both for grasping tree branches and for delivering food to the beak. The parrot's claws are very weak.
Having large wings with wide fans, the parrot is capable of fast flight, but over short distances.
The size of the bird's brain allows it to have a good memory, and its developed vocal muscles contribute to onomatopoeia.
Kea
Another peculiar parrot that lives in New Zealand is the kea or nestor. The main habitat is beech forests and bushes in the mountainous areas of the South Island. The Nestor is similar in size and appearance to a crow. Sometimes an individual grows up to half a meter in length and gains a mass of more than a kilogram. Feathers the color of ripe olives cover the top of the body, and in flight the bright shades of the inner side of the wings are revealed.
Why is this species interesting? Kea are famous for their sharp mind and mischievous nature, they play pranks on the verge of crime:
- approach tourist centers and damage property;
- steal food, accessories and equipment;
- dump trash containers.
The curiosity of parrots knows no bounds; for entertainment, they even gather in groups and lie in wait for people, begging for treats. In bad weather, when the wind blows, kea love to demonstrate the wonders of acrobatics, again for this they need spectators.
The unpleasant activity of these brown pests previously included the fact that they attacked sick and lost sheep. An animal that strayed from the herd was subjected to a brutal attack by birds of prey, which sat on its back and pecked the subcutaneous fat. In a fit of vengeance, farmers began to exterminate the vandal birds, which almost led to the extinction of the species. Now ornithologists are intensively restoring the number of kea, these parrots are protected by law.
Habitat territories
The habitat of this exotic bird is extremely wide. Preferably lives in tropical and subtropical climates. The largest population lives in Australia, the bird's probable homeland. Also common in Asia, India, Africa, South and Central America.
But lovers of warm countries, parrots, are also found in more extreme conditions, for example, at an altitude of more than 4 thousand meters in the Andes.
Also, birds that have undergone acclimatization have inhabited the territory of Western Europe, where their large flocks exceed several thousand individuals.
Lorikeets
The habitat of numerous representatives of this genus is Australia and the islands of Oceania. There are 7 types. Of these, collectors liked the colorful lorikeets the most. They are characterized by bright, multi-colored colors. This is due to the fact that parrots feed on the nectar of flowers and with such colors it is easier for them to camouflage themselves from enemies.
At home, the piercing, creaky cries of these parrots sometimes cause inconvenience. There is only one way out of the situation - to teach your pet to speak as soon as possible. A lorikeet can remember up to 70 words.
They love to fly. They feel bad in cramped conditions. Therefore, the cage must be spacious. But the best solution would be to equip an enclosure.
Varieties of parrots
There are many varieties of the popular beautiful bird. The photo of parrots shows the most common representatives:
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Macaw
A large parrot reaching a length of 95 centimeters, it has brightly colored plumage of various tones. A distinctive feature of the bird is its large curved beak, which is the strongest on earth.
The macaw chose Central and South America as its habitat. They live in flocks, inhabiting tropical forests. Pairs created by birds exist for years.
Natural enemies
Natural enemies of parrots are represented by large feathered predators, as well as many terrestrial predatory animals. The meat of some species of parrots, especially cockatoos and Amazons, is actively used as food by the indigenous Indians inhabiting the territory of South America, as well as by Australian aborigines.
According to the testimony of travelers and scientists, some Indian tribes of the Amazon have long raised macaws. Birds raised in this way are not killed for meat, but are used exclusively for periodically plucking colorful, bright feathers necessary for making ceremonial headdresses.
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Jaco
The second name is Gray Parrot. With a length of about 35 centimeters, the wingspan reaches 65 centimeters. It has two dominant colors in the plumage: gray main color and red in the tail plumage. Lives in the large forests of West Africa.
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During the day they search for food, which consists of oil palm fruits, and in the evening they choose a tall tree to roost for the night. Enormous harm to the population is caused by the mass capture of parrots for further illegal sale.
The popularity of the species is due to its attractive appearance and ability to repeat the human voice. Life expectancy can be more than forty years.
Parrots have been kept as pets for 3,000 years
Parrots were first kept as pets by the ancient Egyptians, and later by the American Indians and Chinese. They were brought to Europe in the 3rd century BC. and were often kept in the homes of rich people or nobles. Such famous figures as Aristotle, Marco Polo, the monarch Henry VIII, Queen Isabella, Marie Antoinette, Victoria, the Washington couple, Teddy Roosevelt and Steven Spielberg had pet parrots.
Today, parrots remain the most popular pet birds in the world. However, keep in mind that if you are planning on getting your own pet bird, it will need plenty of space to exercise and explore. If left untrained, he will become excessively noisy and bite. Parrots' enclosures should be very large and include a variety of toys and materials for them to chew and tear. In addition to mental stimulation in the form of various toys and puzzles, these birds also need constant interaction and affection.
Laurie
Lives in tall, tropical forests of Australia. It eats plant seeds, fruits and berries. The parrot is small in size, the length of which does not exceed forty centimeters. It has very brightly colored plumage.
Capable and intelligent birds, capable of remembering several dozen human words, as well as imitating other sounds they hear.
Corella
Parrots are very popular among amateurs due to their unpretentiousness and ability to learn speech. In natural conditions they live in Australia. Their main color is dark gray. The cheeks, forehead and crest are yellow. It is the crest with its long feathers that distinguishes the beauty of the cockatiel among other parrots. Their weight reaches 100 grams and their length is 33 centimeters.
Cockatiels are characterized by mutations. Therefore, many birds have a color different from the main one. Pearl cockatiels look especially attractive.
Coral
Pearl, otherwise pearl cockatiels are characterized by an attractive pattern on the wings and back. It is formed due to light spots. It is these spots of different sizes that form a bizarre composition, so beloved by many connoisseurs of parrots.
Amazon
Large birds with a dense build and a length of up to 45 centimeters. The predominant color of the plumage is green, with red spots on the head and wings. Habitat: forests of Central and South America. Amazons are listed in the International Red Book.
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Budgerigar
Small talking parrots are most suitable for keeping at home. You can buy them in a nursery from a breeder or at a poultry market at a price of about one and a half thousand rubles. They are easy to care for, consume little food, and make little noise. To all the advantages of birds of this species are added high intelligence, learning ability and the ability to imitate the speech of people.
Budgerigars are attractive in appearance: they are small in size, their main color is green, the color of the grass. On the head, back and wings, the feathers have dark wave-shaped stripes, which is how the birds got their name. Natural grass plumage is not the only color; as a result of selective transformations, many mutations and shades have been obtained. There are white, yellow, and blue birds, but the most extravagant species is the multicolored parrot, in which the two colors of feathers are evenly distributed:
- penguins, chest and belly are separated by color from the back;
- harlequins, belly and sternum of different shades;
- pieds, their feathers have uneven spots.
The average lifespan in captivity is ten years. Fragile wavy birds rarely survive to old age; their death is often associated with the negligent attitude of the owner. With proper and responsible maintenance, a budgie can live 15 years or more.
Lifestyle Features
Parrots have chosen their main arboreal existence. They prefer to settle in tropical forests, less often on plains. Some species live in the mountains. The bird is active during the daytime, during which it hunts for food.
The basis of the diet is a variety of plant foods: seeds, fruits, berries, and so on, but they can also eat animal food - various insects and their larvae.
Cockatoo
These birds got their name due to their powerful beak. "Cockatoo" is a derivative of the Malay word "kakatua", which translates to "nippers". The beak of a cockatoo has a unique structure that allows the bird to:
- crack nuts;
- chew branches;
- bite through metal bars;
- pick locks, etc.
However, despite this, it is not the beak that is considered the main characteristic feature of the cockatoo, but the high, large crest located on the back of the bird’s head. In most individuals it is yellow or pink, but there are exceptions - for example, the Solomon species. This is the name of a white parrot with a crest of the same snow-white hue as the rest of the bird’s plumage. It is worth noting that neither green nor blue colors are found in cockatoo colors.
Despite the fact that cockatoos are large-sized varieties, they are quite popular as pet parrots. The size of the bird ranges from 30 to 70 cm (including the tail). The wingspan is 80 cm. The average lifespan is 40–50 years, but with careful care the bird can live up to 70 or even 90 years.
It is worth noting that the cockatoo cannot be called a friendly and affectionate pet. This aggressive and vindictive bird:
- bites often;
- terrorizes other pets;
- spoils everything that comes across - from furniture and interior items to flowers, wires, books, etc.
In a good mood, they are very playful and can amuse the owner - entertain him with dances, songs, stories, etc. (the cockatoo's voice is loud, ringing). But in order for the pet to switch to peaceful behavior and distract itself from antics and antics, it will have to be carefully trained.
Human use of parrots
Since ancient times, people have used parrots as expensive, exotic gifts from warm countries. Since then, parrots, primarily speaking ones, have been kept in captivity.
In addition, parrot meat is consumed by Aboriginal tribes in the territories where the birds live. The lifespan of wild birds differs from that of domestic parrots by about 60-70% less.
Examples[edit]
Folklore[edit]
- Numerous jokes in which the parrot is presented as a trickster-mocker: An anecdote about a boorish parrot and an airplane passenger who decided to follow his example, who were thrown overboard: “man, this, of course, is none of my business, but for someone who doesn’t know how fly, you’re too greyhound.”
- An anecdote about a parrot who tells a thief who broke into his owners' house that Jesus sees everything and he is not happy. The thief laughingly clarifies the parrot's name. He replies that his name is Judas[3]. Thief: “What idiot would call a parrot Judas?” Parrot: "The same idiot who named his Rottweiler Jesus."
- An anecdote about a parrot who annoyed a magician on board the ship by revealing to all passengers the secrets of his tricks. The angry illusionist decided to show everyone his secret number, announcing that a deadly trick was about to take place. Suddenly, Cthulhu rises from the depths of the ocean, sinks the liner and stomps towards the nearest shore. The only surviving magician contemplates this whole nightmare in complete shock, clinging to a life preserver. Suddenly, the same parrot sits on a floating piece of wood next to him, looks at him thoughtfully with one eye for a long time, and then says: “Okay, I give up. How did you do this?"
- A bawdy joke about a woman whose lover comes to him, saying that he has come up with a particularly intricate game, and the wife tells him that her husband bought a parrot that will tell him everything. The lover suggests covering the parrot's cage with a blanket, so they do so. And then, when the man explains the essence of the game (variations may be different), a wild roar comes from the cage: “Tear out my tongue, but I have to see this!”
- A Soviet joke about a Jew who decided to emigrate to his historical homeland, but customs officials forbade his parrot to be taken out of the country alive - only as a stuffed animal or carcass. The parrot’s reaction: “Syoma, even a carcass, even a stuffed animal, but we need to get out of here!”
- An anecdote about a not-so-honest policeman, a scolding parrot and a priest's parrot. “It’s too late to repent, sinner.”
- An anecdote about how a lady in a pet store points her finger at one of the parrots and asks the seller:
- Can this little green guy talk? The parrot, instead of the seller, answers from the cage: - Madam, frankness for frankness. Are you laying eggs?
- This is separate, since even an unreasonable parrot could learn this if it found itself in the appropriate environment. In general, a bawdy anecdote about one pious young lady who married a virgin. Her parrot, “to the delight” of the groom, voiced a phrase that he had clearly heard more than once in similar situations. The phrase contained an indication of where exactly something should be put and the comment “I still have to get married.”
- An anecdote about how a husband returns from a business trip, enters the bedroom, and then joyfully runs to his wife in the kitchen:
- Honey, can you imagine, our parrot finally spoke today! - Dear, how interesting, what did he say? - “Fuck me with three of us, I’ve dreamed about this all my life!”
- A joke about an interesting pattern: 86% of pirates do not have one eye on the side of the shoulder on which the parrot sits.
Literature[edit]
- “Talking Bundle” by J. Darrell is an intelligent and, naturally, talking parrot, a resident of the Magic Land, who at the same time serves as a source of exposition for the main characters and readers. His name is Parrot, which stands for “Percival Oscar Peregrine Urban Harold Archibald Ykebod”[4].
- Doctor Doolittle and his Soviet colleague Doctor Aibolit both keep intelligent parrots. The first bird is called Polynesia, the second - Carudo.
- “The Life and Extraordinary Amazing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe” by D. Defoe. The parrot is one of the protagonist's pets, tamed on the island. One day he thoroughly frightened his owner when he suddenly began calling him by name: Crusoe had a habit of talking to himself, so the bird memorized his phrases, including calling himself by name.
- “The Green Bird” (a story by K. Baker, published in the collection “Songs of the Dying Earth”) - the legendary wizard Daratello Psittik used two parrots as living flash drives with spells. With the prompter birds on his shoulders, Daratello's magical arsenal increased many times over: although spells in the Jack Vance universe are forgotten after reading, this limitation applies only to sentient beings. At the time of the action, the wizard is considered to have been killed long ago, but one of his birds survived and fell into the hands of two witch sisters - Weissa and Trunadora. The old women are powerful, but stupid, and Kugel (he is the protagonist of this story) decides to kidnap their valuable pet. As it turns out in the finale, the surviving Daratello is hiding from his enemies in the guise of a bird, and Vaissa and Trunadora are his parrots turned into people
. Pedal to the metal regarding bird longevity: it is mentioned that Daratello was a student of the great Fandaal, who lived not even centuries, but millennia ago. - “Dead Head” by A. Belyaev. The entomologist Morel, who was lost in the jungle for years, in order not to forget how to speak and generally not go wild from loneliness, decided to lecture on his subject to the surrounding parrots. However, because of this, he forgot how to speak clearly - the parrots echoed his words, shamelessly misinterpreting them, and as a result, Morel himself began to forget what sounded right.
- Discworld, novel "Eric" - the parrot of the title juvenile demonologist. Notable for his intelligence and limited vocabulary. Because of the latter, many terms are replaced by the catch phrase “What’s-its-name”.
- “The Witcher Saga” by A. Sapkowski - Field Marshal Dub, a parrot that originally belonged to the dwarf Zoltan. Then the parrot was sold to a gnome jeweler, who somehow managed to teach the feathered swearer instead of the signature “Kurrrva mother!” shout “Brrillants!” as a living advertising sign.
- “Three Fat Men” by Y. Olesha - the bearded parrot Laura[5] from the palace garden worked as a living voice recorder, “recording” and retelling in court the entire dialogue between the gunsmith Prospero and Suok who came to rescue him.
- “Khazar Dictionary” by M. Pavic - when difficult times came, Princess Ateh, in order to preserve the dictionary, collected many parrots, taught each one to recite a chapter from the dictionary in the Khazar language, and then released them. The parrots taught other parrots, who taught others, and after many generations, only birds remained speakers of the Khazar language. And even without the “damaged phone” effect.
Music[edit]
- “The King and the Fool”, song “Mutiny on the Ship”. The reason for the main riot was that the captain locked himself in the cabin and began giving completely inappropriate orders through the door. When the sailors, with their patience running out, burst into the cabin, inside they found a dead captain and a parrot, who shouted random commands from all the ones he remembered.
Cinema[edit]
- "Pirates of the Caribbean" - the mute pirate Cotton has a parrot, which he trained to speak for him. Interestingly, none of the other pirates who appeared in the film had parrots.
- “Poly” is Poli the parrot, who has fully mastered human speech.
- “Dumb and Dumber” - Petey the parrot that belonged to the main characters, whose head was twisted off by the mafioso (literally). Lloyd, however, was not taken aback and was even able to benefit from this unpleasant situation by selling a dead parrot with its head glued with duct tape to the blind boy Billy.
Cartoons and animated series[edit]
- “38 Parrots” - The parrot, together with his friends Elephant, Monkey and Boa, delighted and amused Soviet children for many years.
- "Aladdin" is Iago, the sentient parrot of the manipulative warlock Jafar. He is very goatish and selfish, but deep inside he still has kindness - in the second film he even made the transition to the Light Side and helped defeat his former master. In the series he often played leading roles, and in the third film he went to travel with Aladdin’s father, the former leader of the robbers, thus becoming a variation of the pirate parrot.
- “Boatswain and Parrot” - Bosun Roman’s parrot. The phrase “Roma” performed by him became the hallmark of the cartoon. He also has a girlfriend - a female parrot, Riki.
- “Lost and Found” - the parrot Stepanych, an employee of the Bureau and the partner of the dog Tishka in detective cases.
- “Return of the Prodigal Parrot” - Kesha, an intelligent parrot of uncertain species with a quarrelsome character and a tendency to run away from home. Naturally, he chatters like a TV (sometimes he clearly imitates this TV).
- "Steamboat Willie" from 1928, one of the first sound cartoons, is a sarcastic ship parrot who regularly laughs at Mickey Mouse's misfortunes and receives something like a bucket on his head from the angry mouse.
- "Rio" - Blu and Pearl, the main characters, are the last representatives of a rare species of blue macaw. The first one grew up in captivity and doesn’t understand what it’s like to live in freedom, while for the second it’s the opposite.
- "Scooby-Doo: Mystic Corporation" - intelligent parrot Professor Pericles. He was initially kind and served as an animal companion in the previous team of mystery seekers. But then the monster Nibiru brainwashed the parrot, and Professor Pericles became a complete monster and a real criminal genius.
Comics[edit]
- The Oatmeal - two issues about the parrot Grimmets. The feathered creature was very smart and damn vicious.
Video games[edit]
- Claw (better known under the translated name “Captain Claw”) is the parrot of the next boss, the pirate dog Marrow, who helps the owner a lot in the battle with the main character.
- Minecraft - you can use the grain of any plant to tame parrots living in the jungle. The birds can imitate the sounds of the environment and warn the player about the approach of evil mobs, and they also dance funny to the music from the player.
- Neighbors from Hell (better known under the translated title "How to Get Your Neighbor"): In the first game, the Neighbor has a big red parrot. He doesn’t know how to talk, he mostly sleeps, and when the main character walks by not on tiptoe, he wakes up and starts yelling so much that the Neighbor comes running with his fists. However, by the end of the game something happened to the parrot, and the neighbor hung its head on the wall among other hunting trophies.
- In the second part, one parrot is used in a unique way in Mexico for another trap for the Neighbor, while another parrot lives with the captain of the liner and guards the key.
- Unlike other games in the series, the action of the second part takes place in pirate times on an entire archipelago of Tortugas. Parrots can be bred here on a special farm and given to distinguished pirates. The shoulder swearing increases... the courage of the owner, even justified: the parrot encourages the pirate, and he is ashamed to screw up in front of the bird.
