Feathered Guests : Bright Cockatoos and Parrots Find a Home in California

A woman strolling along a sidewalk is suddenly chilled by a scream above her.

She looks up and sees a brilliant white cockatoo sitting on a telephone wire, carrying on what to it is a normal conversation with some blackbirds.

Fifty miles away, a man watches a flock of bright green parrots lunching on his walnut and fig trees.

Scenes from a tropical island, or a sequel to Hitchcock’s horror movie “The Birds?”

Nope. The sightings are in Southern California, where warm climate and backyard orchards have made an inviting home for one of the nation’s biggest populations of exotic birds--most of which are escaped pets.

“The Los Angeles basin is one big aviary,” state Food and Agriculture biologist Jim Johnson says.

By state estimates, there are more than 200 of the feral creatures living in the area, a population second only to those in south Florida and Hawaii.

Jeff Froke, a naturalist with the National Audubon Society sanctuary at Starr Ranch in south Orange County, estimates that the numbers are even higher--more than 300 birds.

Flocks and single birds have been sighted in Pomona, Riverside, the Pasadena-San Gabriel Valley area, the San Fernando Valley, San Pedro, Long Beach, Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, Santa Ana and San Diego, among others.

The feathered creatures are breathtakingly beautiful, obnoxiously noisy and voraciously hungry. But despite worries of some state officials, most of the non-native birds appear to be peacefully coexisting with native species, and don’t seem to be breeding fast enough to pose a serious threat to commercial agriculture.

Only a few species have experts worried, and eradication efforts have kept their numbers in check.

State officials say most of the feral exotic birds are Amazon parrots, mid-sized bright green birds native to parts of southern Mexico and Central and South America.

For some unknown reason, the birds don’t seem to be breeding except in scattered instances.

“It’s something in this latitude, in their habitat, that isn’t sending the signals that they should be breeding,” Froke said.

Some experts fear that may change or that breeding is going on undetected.

“It is a commonly held view that the parrots are not breeding and do not cause a problem,” said agriculture biologist Claire Miller of the state Department of Food and Agriculture.

“But I could easily see a few species growing and becoming a problem in the next five years.”

Two of the species of exotic birds have been placed on the state “hit list,” however, and have been eradicated or thinned out.

Harmful Birds Cut

A flock of Monk or Quaker parakeets, known for their voracious appetite for fruit and commercial grain, has been wiped out in the Los Angeles area, and the red-whiskered Bulbuls of Asia have also been reduced to about 30, although plans for further population reduction are under review.

Both Hawaii and south Florida already have serious problems trying to save their large fruit industry from major damage from their growing population of non-native exotic birds, Miller said.

Some Southern Californians believe the birds already pose a problem with their shrieking calls at dawn and the damage they do to backyard orchards.

“A few people complain about the parrots gathering and heralding the sunrise by screaming bloody murder,” said Pasadena Humane Society’s bird expert, Liz Baronowski. “But most people seem to like them.”

Pet Shop Theory

Folk legends have sprung up about the origin of the birds. In Pasadena, the story goes, dozens of birds were released by a pet store when the shop caught fire nearly 20 years ago.

“There are also stories of smugglers letting them go just before they get caught,” Baronowski said.

Most of the birds are believed to be escaped pets. Joel Pasco, a Costa Mesa veterinarian specializing in exotic pets, has been told of parrots flying out of the clear blue sky onto people’s shoulders.

“They obviously decided life in the wild isn’t as much fun as having someone taking care of them,” Pasco said.

Since the birds are not native, they are not protected by federal or state wildlife laws, and are fair game to capture or hunt. Bird experts caution neophytes to take any captured bird to a vet to test for parrot fever, which can be fatal to humans.