Where Have All the Parrots Gone?

The monk parrots that occupied this nest in Brooklyn disappeared three weeks ago

The wild parrot nests on Avenue I, which teemed with noisy chatter in May, fell silent three weeks ago. In the Mill Basin, Sheepshead Bay, and Marine Park sections of Brooklyn, a similarly eerie silence has been observed in recent weeks among watchers of the birds which have delighted, and occasionally irritated Brooklynites since the 1970's. And just about everybody has a theory about what's causing the parrots to disappear from the streets and skies of Brooklyn.

Some suspect foul play. Bob, a longtime resident of South Brooklyn who has long been delighted by the wild parrots, became convinced that poaching may be reducing the parrot population in Brooklyn after a next door neighbor witnessed several men scaling a Con Ed power pole in the dead of night. "They rode in on bicycles, the leader threw a net over the parrot nest, and they got three or four parrots. Lots of nests are now empty. There are still parrots here but it's not the way it used to be."

The economics of parrot poaching are certainly compelling enough. In local pet stores, baby Quaker Parrots of the kind found living free in Brooklyn can command up to $300 a bird. And because New York State law classifies these parrots as an Unprotected Species (along with pigeons, starlings, and sparrows), parrot poachers -- if they exist -- aren't even breaking the law.

But others doubt that parrot poaching has much to do with the wild parrots' disappearance. "I really doubt that there's much poaching going on in Brooklyn," said Mr. Barabash, whose wife, Janelle, is an active parrot watcher who organized a citizen's committee in 2003 after Con Edison removed all of the wild parrot nests on Avenue I in one fell swoop. "These birds can see 360 degrees and they'd hear an intruder long before he got close and fly away."

If poaching isn't the cause of the parrots' disappearance, what is? Bird flu, West Nile, or other avian ailments seem like longshots, because nobody in Brooklyn's seen any parrot corpses or sick parrots. Even Con Ed, perhaps the Brooklyn birds' most consistent opponent, has been quiescent this summer: while the utility company actively monitors the 130 wild parrot nests in Brooklyn, it hasn't removed more than a handful this summer.

Still, a number of less noticeable causes may be playing a role, including an enormous construction project at Brooklyn College which is happening in the main parrot colony's back yard. Although College officials have taken pains to avoid disturbing the parrots' nests on campus, the scale of such a project may be making the bird's think twice about staying in the neighborhood. And the fact that the summer of 2005 has been unusually dry may also be implicated: without a steady source of fresh water (either in the form of puddles or active fountains), monk parakeets will eventually move on.

Barring a catastrophic event such as a bird flu infection, it's unlikely that Brooklyn's wild population of parrots will disappear anytime soon. Right now, the birds have dispersed widely across the borough, from Red Hook through Sunset Park, Bay Ridge, and even as far south as Manhattan Beach, and many of these colonies seem to be thriving. Even in Midwood, where so many parrots have gone AWOL, there remain birds perching and playing high on the Brooklyn College stadium light poles just a few hundred yards away from the silent nests of Avenue I.

Although these parrots don't migrate, experts agree that they do shift their populations from time to time by pulling up stakes and leaving their once-busy nests behind in silence, and when they do, it's very hard for people to understand why they've abandoned the humans that supported and admired them. And this grief is made harder because no official group, from the Audobon Society to the New York State Fish and Wildlife Service, spends any time studying them or explaining why they came or why they left (monk parrots, after all, "illegal avians" and therefore don't really deserve being studied).

Where have all the parrots gone? You'll have to ask them.