Ahh, c’mon, people’s animal cluelessness gets better than that…
My Mum works at a zoo, and shared some doozies with me recently- a smart looking middle aged lady asked her, in complete seriousness, if monkeys lay eggs. 
Also, a friend of hers at art group, on seeing a picture of a dragon she’d painted, asked if the picture was one of the animals she worked with; it’s a sodding giant wingy scaly thing that breathes fire- what do you think?
As someone else pointed out earlier, birds “like” to fly in the same way that humans “like” to run. Yes, they probably derive some enjoyment out of using their bodies and going where they want, but it really is an effort for them. My own parrots - which spend most of the day outside their cages - can and do sometimes fly up and down the length of our apartment but they also beg to be picked up and carried about as well. Even birds with full flight feathers and no bar to flight don’t actually want to spend all their time flying.
Parrots, such as depicted in the link to the Sea World display, actually spend a fair amount of time just sitting around. A good rule of thumb for a parrot keeper is to encourage your bird(s) to sleep 10-12 hours a night, and allow them to nap mid-day. They generally have a period of activity fairly early in the morning and again in the afternoon. They spend a fair about of their active time climbing rather than flying. They also spend quite a bit of their waking hours sitting in one place and watching the world, or interacting with other birds (or with the humans in their flock).
While we keep food and water dishes in their cages at all times, we vary where we “hide” the other food bowls and bathwater in the home so they have to do a little “hunting” for it.
Parrots have a need for socializing that overrules almost anything else. Parrots would rather be in a small enclosure with a companion or two than alone in a huge enclosure. Solitary parrots don’t do well either emotionally or physically. We might value freedom and flight, they seem to value food and companionship. Part of the problem with anthropomorphizing an animal like a parrot is that their needs and perceptions are very different from ours.
Contrast this to falconry, where a human and a largely solitary bird enter into a partnership. Hawks and falcons used in falconry can fly away at any time, yet they choose to remain. In prior threads by a Doper falconer she has mentioned that her hawks have no need to socialize, they’re solitary by nature, but intelligent enough to (apparently) decide hunting in partnership with a human gets them food even on a bad day of hunting, reliable shelter from bad weather, and the ability to take larger game than they could on their own. No constraint there, yet they put up with hoods and cages and mews when on any hunt they could escape.
Part of what modern zoos do is attempt to figure out what animals really need, what sort of social relationships (if any) they have, and how to keep them from becoming bored. Animal displays with creatures such as parrots which perform for the public aren’t cruel, they can be vital for the health of the animals which enjoy interactions with people and performing. People ask how we get our parrots to talk. Bwah? We can’t get them to stop. Parrots communicate verbally, and human words and phrases are just more addition to their repertoires - it gets them attention and nibbly bits which are a large part of what parrots seek in life.
One additional fact - many zoos will adopt wild animals that are too injured to survive in the wild. Every attempt is made to keep such crippled animals happy. Bald eagles in US zoos, for example, are typically disabled through accident and unable to recover sufficiently to survive on their own. Perches might need to be low enough for the animals to hop onto them or climb onto them if they can’t fly. I once spoke with a keeper for a visually impaired bald eagle - he was familiar enough with his home enclosure that he’d make short flights from perch to perch but outside of it he could NOT be induced to fly because he couldn’t see well enough to make a safe landing. Sure animals might, indeed “have a wing cut off” but it’s usually due to an encounter with a moving vehicle or some other mishap rather than human intent. Keeping such an animal in captivity can be a kindness provided real efforts are made to meet their needs.
Much like how it is thought that proto-birds used their wings and claws.
She probably had monkeys confused with bonobos: they’ll lay anything 
Thanks! I love alcids, but have little experience with them. Keep trying to wangle a trip to the Farallons, to see the tufteds’ nesting.
I’ll take that bet. If not as this sock, the next one.
Well, how about that!
I just want to thank everybody involved in this thread for providing a very entertaining read! 
Good stuff!
No, no. He’s REALLY leaving after that post.
I was going to say “he’ll be back in 72 hours,” but I didn’t have time!
Forgive the tangent, but even if you completely ignore the birds, there are a lot better reasons to never ever go to Sea World, namely for the treatment and care of their marine mammals, particularly their dolphins and whales.
This OP reminds me of when I was in on a band trip in high school for a big parade. I was 16 or 17, and was talking to a guy who was hanging around the area where we were corralled, waiting for our turn to march. He said he was a journalist, and then said “Perhaps you’ve heard of me, I’m William Faulkner.”
I couldn’t believe that I’d just met William Faulkner. I told everybody. Other students. Our chaperones. My band director. They all seemed suitably impressed.
A couple of days later, I learned that not only was William Faulkner *not *Asian, as the man I met was, but he had also been dead a very long time when this meeting occurred.
TL;DR: Teenagers are gullible.
Do they cut their fins off?
That would be bad enough, but sticking them in trees is just cruel.
Maybe she said “The cut the wings” and it got lost or misinterpreted.
Not all zoos are created equal and they are not all good or all bad. However, zoos in the US that are Accrdited by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums you can feel pretty good about, not to say it is ideal or that they are all great all the time. I will say we went to a zoo in Puerta Vallarta and it was very sad, very cramped enclosures, lots of concrete,visible injuries on the animals.
The real thing to be concerned about is Roadside Zoos and Menageries, which are still legal in many places. Another problem of course is the trade in wild animals, which is second only to drugs in terms of illegal international trade.
That’s pretty fucking stupid.
They may do - people make jewlery from whole puffin bill sheaths in the Faroe Islands. They also eat puffins, though, so the sheaths could be from dead birds.
They may do - people make jewlery from whole puffin bill sheaths in the Faroe Islands. They also eat puffins, though, so the sheaths could be from dead birds.
Update: - according to this site they are a byproduct of puffin dinners.
What about Penguins? Close enough right?