City Parrots

MELBOURNE - A bright red parrot and a pale yellow parrot walk into a bar.

“Why so pale?” asks the red parrot.

“I haven’t had a drink in weeks,” says the yellow parrot.

A team of international scientists has spent the past five years investigating what makes some parrots crimson red, others pale yellow and others a splotchy orange-yellow.

And so far they have found that the drier the habitat, the paler the parrot.

Led by Professor Andy Bennett of Victoria’s Deakin University, the team, from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation as well as Dutch and British scientists, has been studying the parrots, in particular the crimson rosella.

“We’re trying to explain what maintains colour variability in parrots, particularly the crimson rosella, which in southern Victoria is deep crimson red, but along the Murray and Murrumbidgee is a pale yellow and in South Australia is a splotchy orange-yellow,” Bennett said.

No simple genetic link has been found to explain why the different-coloured parrots are found in different areas.

But researchers are looking at whether differences in habitat might have an impact.

“In more arid parts the birds are more pale yellow and in higher rainfall areas they are crimson red,” Bennett said.

“So part of our work facilitates some predictions about how coloration and distribution should change with increasing climate change.”