ByChris Iovenko
Published December 13, 2023
• 7 min read
Temple City, California, is an unassuming city east of Pasadena that’s home to the usual busy thoroughfares, shopping malls, and residential neighborhoods that one expects in densely developed Los Angeles County. And in addition to people and their pets, Temple City hosts a surprising avian population.
At dusk, hundreds of wild parrots, some in large flocks, some singly or in pairs, approach from all directions, squawking loudly and circling overhead before settling on a variety of roosts. The brightly colored birds create a spectacle as they land in trees, on power lines, and on cell towers, but what makes them so distinctive is the racket they make.
In the dying light of a recent November evening, I watched as a particularly large flock of green parrots settled into a nearby tree, and thus camouflaged disappeared among the branches. Out of sight, the overwhelming cacophony of the birds seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. The commotion made it easy to understand why a gathering of parrots is called a pandemonium. The squawking sounded chaotic and random, then suddenly the birds went silent, as if a switch had been flipped.
“Look,” said Luke Tiller, my parrot guide and the chapter president of the Pasadena Audubon Association as he pointed at a distinct speck in the sky. “A falcon.”
Tiller explained that flock behavior offers protection to the parrots. Individual parrots alert the flock to danger through vocalizations, and many birds means many watchful eyes. Additionally, the sheer size of the flock deters predators like falcons and hawks from targeting the parrots. As soon as the falcon flew off, the parrots resumed their raucous cries.
Witnessing the parrots returning to their evening roost was a startling and capitivating experience, seemingly at odds with the dense urban environment. It also begged the question: How did these parrots, and others like them across Los Angeles, come to live so far from their native habitats in an environment that is completely different?
Vibrant wings in the City of Angels
Like most good Hollywood stories, the origin of Los Angeles’s thriving wild parrot population is debated and shrouded in myth. Some trace it back to the closure of Busch Gardens Van Nuys in the 1970s, which could have resulted in the release of captive birds into the city environment. There are also unconfirmed stories of mass parrot releases during the 1992 riots, as well as tales of parrots being freed during a fire at a pet store in Pasadena in the 1990s.
“My guess is there’s probably a kernel of truth in most of those stories,” says Jamie Gilardi, the executive director of World Parrot Trust. “I don’t think anyone ever did it intentionally. Parrots are valuable, so they’re probably accidental releases.”
The parrots certainly didn’t make it to Los Angeles on their own. No extant species of parrot has lived in the continental United States since the native Carolina Parakeet went extinct over 100 years ago. The pet trade in one form or another brought these birds to Los Angeles.
Parrots are popular household pets, and some can live to be 80 years old. With over 30 species of parrots currently living in the Los Angeles area, it’s likely that pet birds have escaped over the years and made their way to flocks where they found mates and reproduced.
From the forests to the city
Unlike many non-native species, L.A.’s parrots are relatively benign and haven’t displaced native birds, and therefore aren’t considered invasive by the state of California. The parrots’ main impact has been to amuse or annoy people during the raucous overflights of large flocks. However, due to the severe decline of one species in its native landscape, there may be an important second act for L.A.’s parrots.
The most commonly seen parrot in Los Angeles is the red-crowned parrot, which is native to a small region of northeastern Mexico. Native populations of these birds have been decimated by the illegal pet trade and habitat loss, declining by 95 percent. The birds have been red-listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as an endangered species.
Experts believe the Los Angeles red-crowned parrot population, estimated at over 3,000 birds, is now larger than the remnant population in Mexico. There also might be considerable genetic diversity in L.A.’s parrots, a feature that could prove to be a lifeline for Mexico’s endangered population.
Researchers at the Moore Laboratory of Zoology at Occidental College in L.A. are currently studying the DNA of Los Angeles’ red-crown parrot population and comparing it with DNA from preserved Mexican parrots collected from the 1930s to the 1950s to determine if the L.A. parrots really are direct descendants. If so, then the avian Angelenos could indeed be a valuable “rescue population” for their endangered relatives, says John McCormack, the director of the Moore Laboratory.
“We had these samples that were collected before the pet trade even existed,” says McCormack. “We have the original record of the DNA and genomes of the species, so now we can do a historical DNA comparison to the birds that are in L.A. today.” Some parrot species will interbreed, and McCormack says the DNA analysis will reveal whether the Los Angeles birds are pure genetic descendants of the Mexican parrots or whether they are hybrids.
“From a conservation perspective, and thinking about this as a rescue population for declines in the wild, you are more interested in the pure parrots and establishing that there are reservoirs of the pure native genomes here in Los Angeles,” says McCormack.
Concurrently through iNaturalist, and under the auspices of the Moore Laboratory, there is a citizen science project called the Free-Flying Los Angeles Parrot Project that documents sightings. The project has recorded over 7,000 parrot sightings made by nearly 2,000 members across Southern California.
Urban threats—and hope
Although the Los Angeles parrot population seems to be growing and thriving, it does face threats from humans. A recent video on TikTok shows a man in in Temple City taking parrots that had been captured in nets and putting them in his car. Red-crowned parrots are desirable pets and can sell for up to $2,200 each, which is presumably the motive for poaching them. Residents were outraged by the video, and animal control took down the nets that had been placed in the trees.
Since parrots are a non-native species, they don’t have the same legal protections that native birds do. A state law prohibits the capture of wild animals, which makes it illegal to harm or capture Los Angeles’s wild parrots. However, when L.A. County sheriff’s deputies went to the man in the video’s house, they didn’t find the parrots and determined that the man had not set the nets up. No charges were filed.
The illegal pet trade still poses a threat to the red-crowned parrots, perhaps even those in Los Angeles. However, the current threat seems minimal, and conservationists hope that Los Angeles parrots might someday return to their native habitat to help restore a species on the brink.
“There’s an irony there that the pet trade which is endangering them in their native range has basically seeded this potential rescue population that appears to be thriving in Los Angeles,” says McCormack.
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Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source : National Geographic – https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/los-angeles-flocks-wild-parrots-how-they-get-there