[meteorite-list] OFF TOPIC - Unusual

From: Charlie Devine <moonrock25_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:29:53 2004
Message-ID: <4748-3F5E4E7A-5230_at_storefull-2358.public.lawson.webtv.net>

--WebTV-Mail-20845-2719
Content-Type: Text/Plain; Charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7Bit

Michael and list,

Here in southern New England there exists groups of Monk parrots. These
parrots are, I believe, native to Argentina. The predominant theory is
that they escaped from ships in New York city. They have been here in
Rhode Island, year round mind you, for at least 15 years. I first saw
one of the groups, for they have multiplied into many colonies over the
years, on a Xmas morning at my parent's house where I saw 7 of them
sitting on the backyard clothesline in a snowstorm! Had never heard of
them, but soon a large colony took up residence in a neighbor's tree.
Each pair of parrots has a seperate chamber in a huge communal nest.
When they came home to roost at dusk the din was incredible. It would
suddenly sound like the jungle and I'd deadpan to any visitors "oh,
that's just the parrots. There's about 50 live in a tree out back."
They have since moved on but colonies still thrive here abouts and
elsewhere in New England I'm sure.

Charlie


--WebTV-Mail-20845-2719
Content-Disposition: Inline
Content-Type: Message/RFC822
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7Bit

Received: from smtpinvite-3103.bay.webtv.net (209.240.204.243) by
        storefull-2358.public.lawson.webtv.net with WTV-SMTP; Tue, 9 Sep
        2003 11:18:37 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from pairlist.net (pairlist.net [216.92.1.92]) by
        smtpinvite-3103.bay.webtv.net (WebTV_Postfix+sws) with ESMTP id
        2B9B3BE0A; Tue, 9 Sep 2003 11:18:36 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from pairlist.net (localhost.pair.com [127.0.0.1]) by
        pairlist.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0D86A53838; Tue, 9 Sep 2003
        14:16:12 -0400 (EDT)
Delivered-To: meteorite-list_at_pairlist.net
Received: from mu.pair.com (mu.pair.com [209.68.1.23]) by pairlist.net (Postfix)
        with SMTP id F258053750 for <meteorite-list_at_lists.meteoritecentral.com>;
        Tue, 9 Sep 2003 14:10:42 -0400 (EDT)
Received: (qmail 62232 invoked by uid 7111); 9 Sep 2003 18:10:43 -0000
Delivered-To: arthur-meteoritecentral:com-meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com
Received: (qmail 62225 invoked from network); 9 Sep 2003 18:10:42 -0000
Received: from fed1mtao01.cox.net (68.6.19.244) by mu.pair.com with SMTP; 9
        Sep 2003 18:10:42 -0000
Received: from [68.101.248.84] by fed1mtao01.cox.net (InterMail
        vM.5.01.06.05 201-253-122-130-105-20030824) with ESMTP id <20030909181042.ECCL10480.fed1mtao01.cox.net_at_[68.101.248.84]>
        for <meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com>; Tue, 9 Sep 2003 14:10:42
        -0400
User-Agent: Microsoft-Outlook-Express-Macintosh-Edition/5.0.5
From: Michael L Blood <mlblood_at_cox.net>
To: Meteorite List <meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Message-ID: <BB8365B3.A77B%mlblood_at_cox.net>
In-Reply-To: <BAY4-DAV75Yim0NVmLe00034778_at_hotmail.com>
Mime-version: 1.0
Content-type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"
Content-transfer-encoding: quoted-printable
Subject: [meteorite-list] OFF TOPIC - Unusual
Sender: meteorite-list-admin_at_meteoritecentral.com
Errors-To: meteorite-list-admin_at_meteoritecentral.com
X-BeenThere: meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com
X-Mailman-Version: 2.0
Precedence: bulk
List-Help: <mailto:meteorite-list-request_at_meteoritecentral.com?subject=help>
List-Post: <mailto:meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com>
List-Subscribe: <http://www.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list>, <mailto:meteorite-list-request_at_meteoritecentral.com?subject=subscribe>
List-Id: Meteorite Discussion Forum <meteorite-list.meteoritecentral.com>
List-Unsubscribe: <http://www.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list>,
        <mailto:meteorite-list-request_at_meteoritecentral.com?subject=unsubscribe>
List-Archive: <http://www.pairlist.net/pipermail/meteorite-list/>
Date: Tue, 09 Sep 2003 11:10:43 -0700
X-Brightmail: Message tested, results are inconclusive

WARNING: This is off topic, so, some/many of you may wish to hit
your delete button.

        Yesterday (Sept. 8) a very unusual occurrence took place in my
yard: A flock of a dozen parrots came to eat my leftover sunflower
seeds!=20
         When I went out to pick up the paper at about 8 AM I was alerted
when a neighbor lady called out to me, "Mr. Blood, there are parrots in
your sunflowers!" And, to my delight and amazement, there were,
indeed, parrots feeding off the Russian Giant Sunflowers! I had left
most of them to dry in the sun, even though the birds had been eating
them=8A. but I had surely never seen parrots doing so.
    In fact, there were twelve of them =AD an entire flock. And
beautiful they were, indeed. Most amazing, they were clearly
all the same species.
    I grabbed my camera and went out to get some photos. You can see
most of the photos I captured of these beautiful creatures at:

http://community.webshots.com/album/89632975MfUNTL

(Particularly nice are photos # P16 & P15)

    I later researched the species. They had beautiful blue
heads, orangish top beak and near black bottom beak with
a little blue in their underwing and red in the underside of
some of their tail feathers. Their legs and feet were flesh
colored and when I later examined their photos closely, I
could see no bands on any of their legs, indicating they likely
escaped bird importers in the Tiajuana area and/or have
bread in the wilds of this area. They turned out to be Sharp-tailed
Conures (Aratinga acuticaudata) which are native to Brazil,
Bolivia, Uruguay and Argentina. So, they are clearly an escaped
flock that have naturalized in the area.
    It is very rare to see parrot flocks in San Diego, but one
hears of them appearing here & there on occasion. Usually,
however, such flocks are reported to contain mixed species
of parrots, presumably attracted to their own kind having
escaped captivity individually. This is the only occurrence
I have been aware of where an entire flock was the same
species.=20
    In any event, I will certainly be planting more sunflowers
next year!=20
    Best wishes, Michael

=20


______________________________________________
Meteorite-list mailing list
Meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com
http://www.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list

--WebTV-Mail-20845-2719--
Received on Tue 09 Sep 2003 06:04:42 PM PDT