Birds and Birding's Guide to:

Watching THE CUCKOO-LIKE BIRDS

THE PARROTS

Carolina Parakeet

Very closely related, and indeed included with the Conures by the American ornithologists, is the monotypic Carolina Parakeet (Conuropsis carolinensis), the only Parrot really indigenous in North America north of Mexico. This is a handsome little species about twelve and a half inches in length, with the head and neck all around yellow, the forehead, cheeks, bend of the wing and tibia orange, and the remainder of the plumage bright green.

When this country was first settled the Parakeet was found to be common and quite generally distributed throughout most of the eastern United States, being most abundant in Florida and the Gulf States, but extending northward along the valleys of the Mississippi, Illinois, and Ohio rivers, reaching Maryland, the Great Lakes, Iowa, and Nebraska, and exceptionally Michigan and New York. But the unfortunate possession of a bright-colored plumage, coupled with a degree of destructiveness to fruit orchards, and gregarious habits which prompt them to attempt the succor of wounded companions, have conspired to so thin their ranks that they seem actually on the verge of extermination, being now restricted to a few localities in the middle portions of Florida, Arkansas, and the Indian Territory. Of their appearance in bygone days, we may quote from Nuttall, one of the most graceful of our early writers, who says: “

The Carolina Parakeets in all their movements, which are uniformly gregarious, show a peculiar predilection for the alluvial, rich, and dark forests bordering the principal rivers and larger streams, in which the towering cypress and gigantic sycamore spread their vast summits over a wide waste of moving or stagnant waters. From these, the beech and the hackberry, they derive an important supply of food.

The flocks moving in the manner of Wild Pigeons dart in swift and airy phalanx through the green boughs of the forest; screaming in a general concert, they wheel in wide and descending circles round the tall buttonwood, and all alight at the same instant, their green vesture, like the fairy mantle, rendering them nearly invisible beneath the shady branches, where they sit, perhaps arranging their plumage, and, shuffling side by side, seem to caress and scratch each other's heads with all the fondness and unvarying friendship of affectionate Doves. If the gun thin their ranks, they hover over the screaming wounded or dying, and returning and flying around the place where they miss their companions, in their sympathy seem to lose all idea of impending danger.”

A few years ago Mr. Chapman found one sad remnant, aggregating perhaps fifty birds, near the head waters of the Sebastian River in eastern Florida, where their favorite food seemed to be the seeds of a large thistle, and Mr. Ridg-way discovered a somewhat larger colony in southern Florida. The cockle-bur was formerly a favorite food, and it was their custom to feed in the early morning hours, after which they retired to hollow trees to spend the warmer part of the day, venturing forth again toward evening.

They are said to roost at night in hollow trees, clinging side by side in an upright position to the sides of the cavity by means of bill and feet. The Carolina Parakeet makes an engaging though usually quiet and demure pet, acquiring an affection for its attendant, but not being apt at the imitation of human language. They breed, though rather irregularly, in captivity, laying sometimes four or five eggs; but of their nesting habits in a state of nature we are practically in ignorance. They are said to place the nest in a hollow tree and to deposit two eggs, but exact data on the subject are wanting.

 

 

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