LONDON – When Lincolnshire Wildlife Park chief executive Steve Nichols was heard by staff swearing in the front room, they went to tell him.
But there were no employees in the next room. Only birds.
He then realized that the five parrots that migrated to the park that same week shared an unfortunate trait: they all had dirty, dirty mouths.
With more colorful language than plumage, African gray parrots – Billy, Elsie, Eric, Jade and Tyson – used different curse words in different British accents, but they were all utterly coarse. At one point, a group of women passing by the birdhouse thought the vague comments screaming at them belonged to a hidden staff member, Mr. Nichols said.
He said the park had no complaints – in fact, visitors were swearing back on the birds – but park officials feared the children and parents might not enjoy the experience so much. Chili birds were moved to a temporary space away from public view, giving them time to be around more family-friendly birds and hopefully clearing their vocabulary.
The birds are expected to be released back into the main colony on Wednesday after a period of misbehavior.
One of the big problems with parrot language, he said, was that he was hilarious.
“When parrots swear, it’s so hard for other men to laugh,” he said. “And when we laugh, it’s a positive response. And so, what they do is both laugh and swear. “
“It’s not that bad on its own,” he continued. “But, then if you swear once in five together and the other one laughs, and before you know it, it feels like a group of teenagers or an old working men’s club.”
One parrot was especially proud, he said: “Billy is the worst.”
The birds arrived at the park about 130 miles north of London at the end of August Gust from five different owners in Britain. Mr Nichols said each owner apologized that their pet may have chosen some of the preferred words.
They were among about 20 birds to arrive in a single week and spent a week together in different parts. (Behaved well with others.) Parrots are usually quiet when placed in public, so staff thought it would be safe to put them out.
It wasn’t. When Mr. Nichols first saw visitors gathering outside the flight, he thought they were there to see Chico, who called Beyonc “” If I were a boy. ” Learning to sing gained small fame this month. Instead, he saw parrots and guests cruelly cursing each other.
Now that the birds have been removed from the public exhibitions, some guests are coming who have heard of the rude birds but do not know what cage they are in. So, they hope they ‘swear to all the birds,’ get back a little abuse, Mr Nichols said.
An explosion of levity is needed, Mr. Nichols said. The park was forced to close for 20 weeks during efforts to contain the coronavirus epidemic, and has been burned down financially. And with more birds being taken to the center than ever before, working-home-sitting parrot owners suddenly realized they had forced their pets to spend too much time in cages.
Parrots can pick up frequently used words from their owners, mimic sounds, if they do not understand the meaning. The park sometimes catches birds with such false noises, Nichols said, but having five in the same week was “the most exciting set of coincidences.”
Cursing is not usually a big problem – although parrots retain the memory of naughty words, they usually adapt their behavior to a large colony, most of which do not give customers vague names. Mr. Nichols expects them to be at their best.
“They’ve also got really good vocabulary,” he said. “It’s just that we’ve only heard swear words.”
