| A well fed wild Indian ring necked parakeet psittacula
krameri (manillensis) in the garden next to mine in Surbiton Surrey UK.
There is an Oxford University research project by Chris Butler dedicated
to the distribution of these exotic visitors to UK & a very informative site at Norwood
Grove. There are a number of suggestions as to how they came to be here, including
release from Shepperton Film Studios when The African Queen was being filmed or
later in the 1970's, to accidental releases from quarantine at Heathrow Airport. Under
the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 the Ring necked
Parakeet is on Schedule 9 as an animal which may not be released into or grown
in the wild, so these parakeets
are breaking the law! Fortunately they have not spotted my plants yet, as parrots
& parakeets can be a major pest for commercial Passiflora crops. They are now very abundant in UK with some colonies of thousands. |