Facts About the Bird Parrot

Parrots are fascinating, intelligent, beautiful birds valued for centuries as companions and objects of curiosity. Many of the species can be trained to speak, be housebroken and learn a variety of tricks. However, their intelligence and wild tendencies can make a pet parrot challenging.

  1. History

    • Introduced into Europe by Alexander the Great around 327 B.C., parrots have a long and rich history. Parrots are first mentioned in European literature in a work by Ctesia, written in 397 B.C., in which he describes a bird that could speak. Wealthy men and women of ancient Rome would keep parrots as a sign of their status, and elaborate cages made from precious metals have been uncovered from this time period. In the Americas, there is evidence of a parrot trade among Southwestern Native Americans.

    Description

    • Parrots make up a large order of over 350 members including parakeets, macaws, amazons, lorikeets, lovebirds and cockatoos. Each of them have strong, curved beaks and each have four toes on each foot, two facing front and two facing back. Parrots can be found naturally in warm, equatorial climates across the globe. Their diet consists of seeds, fruit, flowers, nuts and even insects.

    Pets

    • There are a few considerations to be addressed before choosing to adopt a parrot as a pet. Unlike many domesticated animals, these birds are only a few generations removed from the wild and therefore will exhibit many of the same behaviors they would in their natural habitat. Many pet parrots will scream, bite, can be messy and demanding. Pet parrot owners liken it to having a perpetual toddler in the home. Pet parrots can live for 80 to 90 years, making ownership a lifetime commitment.

    Intelligence

    • Parrots' high level of intelligence is making scientists rethink where intelligence actually stems from in the brain. Previously thought to be the highly complex neocortex, a brain structure found only in mammals and most pronounced in humans, the absence of such a structure in other intelligent animals may indicate an alternate source for intelligence. Not only can parrots learn to speak, but it has been shown they are able to reason much like humans and that they possess cognitive skills beyond, well, simply parroting.

    Conservation

    • The illegal capture and trade of wild parrots for pets has become a detriment to the birds' survival in their natural habitat. The yellow-headed parrot is perhaps the most popular pet parrot and most severely affected by illegal trade. According to Cornell University's Lab of Ornithology website, "the wild population of this species plummeted from 70,000 birds in the mid-1970s to an estimated 2,000 today, though an exact number is still to be determined." Efforts are under way in countries where the parrot is becoming endangered to protect them and their environment.