I was in London over the weekend and it was full of them. We literally heard them everywhere we went. They blended into the trees surpisingly well. When the cannon went off by the cenotaph at 11.00 about 20 flew from seemingly nowhere directly toward Her Majesty! Don't worry too much about their impact, everything has an impact on everything else at some level and if you moan too much about it the daily mail picks it up and people start to believe that killing the entire species is a good idea - seriously it's happened before and is happening now with other birds. Luv Dave
We are ( or at least should be ) far better informed these days so don't even have the excuse of our Victorian forebears who introduced endless exotics both plant and animal.
The exotic pet and plant trade is worse than ever and fuelled by the internet for both fads and easy access to illegal sales. Look at how bad places like Florida are getting now for invasive species. We're just lucky to have a climate that keeps numbers down.
If you can keep your head, while those around you are losing theirs, you may not have grasped the seriousness of the situation.
The trouble is, they're not stupid like pigeons. One has worked out how to circumvent the spring loaded squirrel proof effort that I have in my garden. I had to shake the washing line to dislodge it.
I sometimes find it strange that we view parakeets as pests rather than a species that has successfully found a niche for itself. The Collared Dove only arrived here in the UK in the 1950's and has around 990,000 breeding pairs. The Ring Necked Parakeet only started breeding here in 1969 and has 8,600 breeding pairs. Maybe we just notice the parakeets because they are bright green and noisy?
“Every day is ordinary, until it isn't.” - Bernard Cornwell-Death of Kings
As far as whether they're having an impact on other birds, they obviously are even if it's simply the matter of a Parakeet eating a fallen apple means another, native bird or animal can't eat that apple.
That said, they've been here quite awhile, and short of a massive cull are not going anywhere.
I have heard that they can be a negative impact on other birds just because of their size and raucous calls are intimidating to native birds but from the little I've seen of them alongside other birds at least Pigeons, Magpies, Crows and Seagulls (funnily enough our native 'pests') don't seem to care, but then here we only have relatively few of them compared to the hundreds further into London. I imagine Robins and other smaller birds would avoid them, but then they tend to avoid everything anyway. Certainly in our garden if a Robin is happily hopping along the path and a Pigeon shows up the Robin vanishes.
On the flip side I have heard that our native birds of prey don't seem averse to going after them either so there's pluses and minuses all over.
Does anyone have any idea how to stop them eating all the apples in our trees? We haven't had a single apple to eat from the trees in the last three years! We weren't sure if it was the parakeets or not until we ended up at home all the time this year with lockdown and could see what they were doing! We've removed the bird feeder that was initially attracting them, and hung old CDs and a child's windmill in one tree, but it doesn't seem to have stopped them at all.
Does anyone have any idea how to stop them eating all the apples in our trees? We haven't had a single apple to eat from the trees in the last three years! We weren't sure if it was the parakeets or not until we ended up at home all the time this year with lockdown and could see what they were doing! We've removed the bird feeder that was initially attracting them, and hung old CDs and a child's windmill in one tree, but it doesn't seem to have stopped them at all.
Hang a houndstooth patterned jacket next to the tree. Parakeets and parrots are prey animals in the wild, they are genetically wired to stay away from predators, and for whatever reason the houndstooth pattern triggers the flee behavior, especially as it will move in the wind.
Same reason why you should never wear one near a pet parrot, or make striped brown cardboard visible etc. They go absolutely panic mad, very stressful.
Posts
Don't worry too much about their impact, everything has an impact on everything else at some level and if you moan too much about it the daily mail picks it up and people start to believe that killing the entire species is a good idea - seriously it's happened before and is happening now with other birds.
Luv Dave
The Collared Dove only arrived here in the UK in the 1950's and has around 990,000 breeding pairs.
The Ring Necked Parakeet only started breeding here in 1969 and has 8,600 breeding pairs.
Maybe we just notice the parakeets because they are bright green and noisy?
That said, they've been here quite awhile, and short of a massive cull are not going anywhere.
I have heard that they can be a negative impact on other birds just because of their size and raucous calls are intimidating to native birds but from the little I've seen of them alongside other birds at least Pigeons, Magpies, Crows and Seagulls (funnily enough our native 'pests') don't seem to care, but then here we only have relatively few of them compared to the hundreds further into London. I imagine Robins and other smaller birds would avoid them, but then they tend to avoid everything anyway. Certainly in our garden if a Robin is happily hopping along the path and a Pigeon shows up the Robin vanishes.
On the flip side I have heard that our native birds of prey don't seem averse to going after them either so there's pluses and minuses all over.
Same reason why you should never wear one near a pet parrot, or make striped brown cardboard visible etc. They go absolutely panic mad, very stressful.