I decided I’d run down to the gas station this morning. As I started up a narrow road, I flicked my windshield wiper control to get rid of some of the condensation. Just then I saw a red-and-yellow parrot standing just off the road. Since this was close to the intersection, I wasn’t going fast. I got a decent look at it.
Now, I used to see parrots all the time. Mostly green ones. But I lived in L.A. and worked in Orange. There are loads of parrots down there. Now I live in the very northwest corner of Washington state (excluding Point Roberts), and it’s 42ºF outside. How strange to see a parrot here. I returned home by the same route, hoping to see it again. I didn’t see it, but there was a guy taking a walk. I asked him if he’d seen a parrot, and he looked at me as if I was mad. He wondered if I didn’t see a chicken. No, it was red-and-yellow. He agreed that sounded like a parrot. Perhaps, he opined jokingly, I’d had too much to drink.
I’ve seen photos and videos of parrots living in snow. It would be cool to have a population of parrots up here. But they might have exciting lives, what with all of the raptors.
They escape by accident occasionally. If you were so minded, you could look at local vet offices for lost bird notices, or even report the sighting yourself on the Bird Hotline.
It’s an outside chance but you might be able to re-unite a family.
The macaw photo has blue. I didn’t see any blue on this bird. Just red and yellow. Not a tanager, either (though I’m not an expert). It was parrot-sized and parrot-shaped, and was brilliantly coloured.
I remember when we started to see and hear lovely little house and purple finches here in the Midwest. Had to do a little research to find out what they were.
They were from a country far to the south of us, I read, and their arrival here began with escape from a New York pet shop.
Given the colors, the size, and the fact that it was on the ground, it might have been a scarlet macaw with the blue flight feathers clipped. Maybe it hopped out of someone’s window or car.
Half the size of a pigeon does not sound like a macaw, unless they have very big pigeons up there. Most parrots are predominately green, for the colors and size given it sounds like a conure, parakeet (not the budgie type of 'keet) or lory/lorikeet.The latter probably won’t do well in the wild with winter coming. They are fruit and nectar eaters.
We don’t see many escaped parrots here. We do see a lot of Cooper’s hawks. Maybe there’s a connection?
(Yeah, one of mine escaped once, which led to a bizarre adventure in which a small child heard the bird calling, I ran into the countryside to get it, coyotes started singing, I yelled at my boyfriend, who was following me “Somebody shut up the G*damm coyotes” and then found the bird. The bird was angry and wondered where I had been.)
