City ParrotsUrban Scarlet Macaw & Parrot Conservation

At the start of May we got a few days off from work and decided to investigate the City Parrots of Germany. Our first stop was at Schlosspark Biebrich Wiesbaden. Read on…

By MARIANELA JIMENEZ Associated Press Writer

LA GARITA DE ALAJUELA, Costa Rica—Endangered scarlet macaws born in captivity are reproducing in the wild for the first time on Costa Rica’s southern Pacific coast. Read on…

Scientific American

If you use cocaine and need a reason to quit—or one to avoid starting in the first place—think conservation. The national parks of Guatemala and other countries have become the preferred haven of drug traffickers who usurp protected areas and burn the forest to serve their own purposes and the demands of their customers, according to Roan McNab, Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) country director for Guatemala. Read on…

The Oregonian by Holley Gilbert

VANCOUVER — Wild Quaker parrot enthusiasts are joining forces March 1 in Yacolt to erect more alternative nesting sites in an effort to keep the colorful birds from building on Clark Public Utilities’ transformers, where they pose a safety hazard. Read on…

By Amy Crawford Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Steve Baldwin spotted the first handful of bright green quaker parrots at the grassy margin of an Astroturf soccer field. Excitedly, he pointed them out to the dozen people who had signed up for what he calls a “wild parrot safari”.

“They’re doing what they love to do on a day like this — come down and forage,” Baldwin said, as the birders snapped pictures. “They like to eat grass, clover, weeds. When the sun hits them, they glow, like an emerald color.”

Suddenly something spooked the birds, and they took off, squawking loudly and swooping through the air, to land in a nearby oak tree and on the roof of an apartment building.

“Yeah, they like to roost in that tree,” said Baldwin. “It’s safe from predators.” Read on…

The Star-Ledger

If you want to experience a taste of the tropics here in the Garden State, you must visit the monk parakeet colony in Edgewater. Read on…

Seattle Times

Sharon Matola, the “Zoo Lady” of Belize, is an unlikely environmental hero. A one-time Iowa housewife, she trained in jungle survival with the Air Force, rode freights to Florida to study animal behavior and apprenticed to a Romanian tiger tamer. Later she worked as a circus dancer (with tigers) in Mexico. In the early 1980s, she helped film a nature documentary in Belize. At the end of the shoot, she inherited 20 exotic jungle animals, and the Belize Zoo was born.

A quarter-century later, Matola is a widely respected authority on the scarlet macaw and other tropical species. Her zoo is among the most popular tourist attractions in Belize. And she is successfully restoring harpy eagles and other threatened species to the Belize jungle. Read on…

By Howard Buck, The Columbian

YACOLT — Several Quaker Parrots who have made an unlikely home in this rural burg were a cheerful bunch on Saturday. Read on…

By Tom Vogt, Columbian

Yacolt - It’s an appealing mixture of food, fellowship and shelter.

Actually, it’s a trap. But Christopher Driggins hopes the parrots of Yacolt won’t realize that until the door slaps shut.

See video

The Vancouver man is part of a campaign to capture the tropical birds so they don’t have to face a grimmer fate. The Quaker parrots - some people call them Monk parakeets - have been trespassing on power poles, and three were killed in an effort to keep the birds from weaving their big nests around electrical transformers. Read on…

By Tom Vogt, Columbian

Yacolt’s parrots are in a holding pattern.

The tropical birds are no longer under an imminent death sentence, but the town’s parrot advocates must find a new hangout for their feathered friends. Read on…