Thursday 9 July 2009

Parakeets in London!


This will be a blog entry which will confirm all my friends worst suspicions about me! Following last weekend in London, I've been wondering about the Parakeets we watched each morning in Graham and Gill's garden where we stayed. The thing which struck Maggie was that had we been in Nepal I'd have been really excited and trying to capture them with my camera all day - in this case I only got it out of the bag to prove I was vaguely interested. "So, why aren't you bothered?" 
On the one hand I was genuinely interested in these beautifully coloured birds, but ....... the fact they shouldn't have been there meant I viewed them as imposters and the other half of me was wondering what their presence was doing to resident species etc (told you you'd dispair!).
I'd seen wild Parakeets in London before, but did not realise the population had now grown to an estimated 30,000 by 2007 and projected to rise, by the RSPB, to 50,000 by next year - that's a load of Parakeets and they're rising up the most 20 sighted birds in London at a rate of knots. Apparently, there is no evidence as yet they are damaging domestic species, which makes me feel a bit better, but I still can't get anywhere near as excited by them as I would be elsewhere - perhaps I need some counselling?

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