THE KING PARROT.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19691, 19 January 1926, Page 7

THE KING PARROT.

A BEAUTIFUL AUSTRALIAN BIRD. The beautiful king parrot seems tb be more rarely seen than formerly; in tact, the same remark would apply to most o£ our parrots, I believe (writes Will Carter in the Sydney Morning Herald). When I was a boy in the Adelong district 1 needed only to go out in the paddock and whistle a few shrill parrot pi ing-prings, when, in a moment almost, I would hear an answering call from the lorries, and a little persistent mimicking brought sometimes one, sometimes a brace, and often a family party of the lovely birds into the trees around me. Now, however, I “pring” with poor results, which seems strange from the very fact that in the old barbaric bush days parrots were the foundation of the. popular birdpie, and fell in shocking numbers to the bushman’s forage-gun. In all my youthful ramblings in and around Adelong and Tumut I never remember having seen the king parrot either caged or free; but here, in the lovely valleys of the Kurrajong slopes, the lovely big beauties are found, but never in large numbers, six being the largest number I have seen in a company. Just here in the vicinity of “Bellbird Corner,” which Rod Quinn has recently enthused over in sparkling verse so typical of that sweet singer, and so true, there is a little orchard-home often visited by these birds, and, as the boys are expert “cribhers” or trappers, many a green beauty goes faring citywards to captivity. Many people err in thinking that the king parrot will not “talk.” I have one that has quite an extensive vocabulary, and which splendidly mimics the cat’s meowing, the canary’s trill, and the “quilly-ark” of the grey magpie. They certainly do not begin to talk as quickly as the lory or rosella —mine was 12 months caged before he started with “Hello, Dad!”—but now it’s really entertaining to hear him, especially at dawn. The male bird exactly resembles tbe female (save that his beak is red instead of black) until his third year, when vivid red replaces the green head and neck plumage, and the lovely pale green “butterfly” becomes more conspicuous on each wing. This adornment extends each year up till about the seventh year, when it is about four inches long, The lovely black pupil of the eye is ringed with brilliant yellow, the circle slightly widening as age advances. They nest in knotholes of tall trees, and their eggs, two in number, arc white, as in the case of cockatoos and other birds that nest in dark recesses.