This is a kea. Isn't he cute? Happy, little green parrot...tra la la.
This little parrot will mess your s**t up. If you are a sheep. Image courtesy Flickr user PhillipC, via CC.
Happy, little green parrot who calmly burrows through the still-living flesh of sheep and dines upon their kidney fat while they lay bleating in terror. No, really. You can see a video here. Watch Clip 4, starting about two minutes in.
And now, the context....
Kea are incredibly intelligent mountain parrots, native to New Zealand. Most of the time, they eat the sort of things you'd expect parrots to eat: Berries, nectar, insects. But that food is in short supply during the winter months, and kea--while they do migrate from mountain tops down into the warmer valleys--don't fly away to summer climes. Plus, the encroachment of ranches, farms and cities drove off a lot of their traditional food sources over the last few centuries. So, in winter, the birds are sometimes forced to get creative about their meals. And that's where the sheep come in.
Unsurprisingly, ranchers are not pleased. There've been legends of sheep-killing parrots since the early days of European colonization in New Zealand. Kea were killed off in droves and even had a bounty on their heads for a while. Ironically, though, a lot of people claimed the legends were just that, right up until kea were caught on film, dining on sheep in 1993---seven years after conservationists won a hard-fought battle to protect the birds against the threat of hunting and extermination. Today, they're still a protected species, but their numbers are also still on the decline---thanks to habitat loss, falling prey to other animals, and sometimes deadly human attempts to keep the inquisitive (and frequently destructive birds) away from cars and bicycles.
The keas' story is a complicated tale of what happens when humans tamper with nature...and nature tampers back. Great stuff. Thanks to Nathan Torkington for the video link!
RSS Feed
Ouch. The narrator mentions that the sheep sometimes suffer from blood poisoning afterwards - I wonder what the survival rate is? It certainly doesn't look pleasant for the sheep although it seemed to have resigned itself to it at the end of that section.
To be honest, I don't really buy this whole 'This is what you get when you tamper with nature' stuff though. Sure you can't predict all the outcomes of making changes to a complex system, but that's all it is.
How cute, that little green parrot is riding on the back of the fluffy - Ahhhhhhhhh!
Certainly the sheep can be taught to stop, drop, and roll...
I'm impressed. How does a parrot figure out there's some good kidney fat tucked back there? You're flying around, your a parrot. You spot some of the eight homillion sheep that have popped up. /You decide to land on one and poke around its back digging for kidney fat/? How'd that last bit come about?
Suet is kidney fat, and birds love that. These critters have just cut out the middle man. :) They are smart!
I was at Fox Glacier, in New Zealand's South Island. A Kea there had picked up a match box from the ground, and was 'bulldozing" all of the rain water off the roof of my car. Backwards and forwards for about 20 minutes, until it was clear. Cute. Then it ripped the rubber out of one of my windscreen wipers, on the drivers side, and left me to drive out as it began to rain again. Unfortunately, I don't have pictures or a movie to post as a kind of a unicorn chaser to the original story.
Too bad they aren't as happy and friendly as another rare New Zealand parrot...
Shagged by a rare parrot:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9T1vfsHYiKY&feature=player_embedded
I'm always fascinated by the things animals do in order to adapt to the changing environment (whether or not changed by humans). Reminds me of a bird's nest a friend of mine found in Oakland in a tree near a parking lot that had recently had work done on its chain link fence - the nest was actually made largely out of cut pieces of chain link fence and weighed about two pounds!
I just wanted to note that we have no ranchers in New Zealand, only farmers.
Keas are great birds. They are well known for pulling all the rubber off cars: http://icons-pe.wunderground.com/data/wximagenew/b/bugzmate/3.jpg
They have the ability to plan and carry out sequences of actions to attain goals (food), rather than simply going for the fastest and often unhelpful manouvre. Hence the planning needed to burrow their beaks into sheep for fat.
Rarely have I laughed (out loud) quite so hard during a video as when they got the close-up on that parrot's o-face and it looked like an insanely happy muppet.
Maybe it should go on the main page as a "happy parrot" chaser? More people should be alerted to the brilliance that is the original Last Chance to See and the great promise of Steven Fry and Mark Carwardine's follow-up series.
Sheep are famously dumb. A friend of mine who is a sheep farmer says they are "Born trying to die..." because they constantly injure themselves and seem to have no concept of danger.
Yeah, kea are fun birds. One of the local breweries is running a campaign at the moment on the theme of "don't mess with nature" - saw a bus this morning, with the rear painted to depict a trio of kea messing around in the engine bay...
Maybe the sheep just stole the secret of fire.
Aww makes me miss my old Conure. Parrots and parrot-like birds are just the most amusing clever critters.
I see what you did there. Bravo.
Here is a whole different kind of hardcore parrot http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/10/zoologist_gets_shagged_by_enda.php
Oh, man, what next? Predatory unicorns?!?
It's interesting how nature adapts to changing situations, whether man-made or natural. It looks kinda painful and somewhat gross, but when you have to eat, you have to eat. Survival of the fittest. In this case the fittest have sharp beaks and can fly.
There's an interesting theory that keas originally used to predate on moas -- who, while large, were kind of placid and slow-moving. Much like sheep, actually.
I think it is incumbent upon New Zealand sheep farmers to genetically engineer armor-plating upon their sheep's backs.
I enjoy eating lamb for so many reasons, one of them being it means they don't have to become a sheep.
Naughty bird. Naughty, naughty bird. Oh well, poor sheep.
You know what would be awesome?
A Kea feeder that you wear on your face.
Eat your heart out, Alfred Hitchcock.
(Or let the birdies do it for you.)
Kea are awesome... gangs of teenage kea raid hikers' camps, eating their boots and rubbery bits! very intelligent birds, and yes, no ranchers in NZ (that be a yankee word!)
Horrible creatures. Should be wiped from the face of the Earth.
"Horrible creatures. Should be wiped from the face of the Earth."
Sheep or Kea?
The Pōkeko, another indigenous New Zealand bird, will cheerfully bite the heads off chicks and young ducks if it's usual diet of insects and vegetation is in short supply.
Can anybody still doubt that these guys are descendents of dinosaurs? Cute little cuddly velociraptors, I tell ya'...
Either you mean Pukeko, or that's a Maori dialect I've not seen before (also you can see I don't know how to create a macron over the "a" in Maori).
Just for fun, here's a photo of a pukeko chick : http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_yhG15h2_TxY/ST18KTAlypI/AAAAAAAABqE/s9MkpUMuv4c/s320/DSCF3028.jpg
Connie H had the right idea. Armor plating for your sheep. Sort of a sheepish reverse brasiere.
I just love the posts from Maggie. Keep 'em coming!
"Happy, little green parrot...tra la la."
There's a whole chapter on the Kea in Last Chance to See, Douglas Adams very funny book on the very unfunny subject of extinction.
He portrays the Kea as a rather hapless and goofy bird stumbling amiably to extinction. I don't remember any bits about Kea treating sheep the way Han Solo treats Tauntauns...
Having just returned from 6 months in New Zealand, I can testify about how aggressive these birds are.
ON the way back out of Milford sound we stopped for a quick photo on the side of the road. I jumped out, grabbed my camera out of the back of the car and stupidly left the hatch open. I hadn't taken more than 10 paces form the car when about 4 or 5 of 'em descended upon the car and started pecking at everything they could. They were not happy about me trying to get them out of the car.
They are smart and super aggressive. They'll pick off anything from a car: antenna's, windshield wipers you name it, if it can be torn or pried off they'll go for it.
It really is a fascinating and absolutely beautiful parrot.
Ha! I just got back from NZ a few days ago myself, and saw one of these absolutely massive birds while hiking the Franz Josef glacier. The guides I talked to all had stories of the keas pestering them while working the glacier, only to find out one was distracting the guide while another was ripping his lunch out of his rucksack in the background. "Clever girl"...
Very smart and gigantic. Thankfully my encounter with one was pretty passive, aside from its literally bounding across the glacier, but I got a load of great photos.
Just wish the moa were still roaming NZ. Now that was an freaky looking bird...
Damn, and I thought blowflies were bad for sheep.
Kea are really smart, _playful_ birds. They live in an incredibly harsh environment so get by through _playing_ with everything! Whether it's nailed down or not! Through play they discover.
I'm endlessly fascinated by them and every tale I hear and every time I see them (which I do as often as possible) I'm struck by what marvelous characters these birds are.
A small example. I stopped for a coffee up at Arthur's Pass... and a Kea hopped onto the back of the chair opposite me across the table.
Naturally I reach for my camera to take a photo of him... and as I lifted the camera to my eye, the kea hopped on to the table and took a swig of my coffee!
No, having observed these birds quite a bit now... I don't believe there was any coincidence there, The Kea knew my hands were going to be too occupied to defend my coffee!
Someone said...
>> Horrible creatures. Should be wiped from the face of the Earth.
> Sheep or Kea?
Sheep. Sheep are just too stupid to live. Kea's are smart, funny, playful and the best damn survivors on the planet. You just try live where they live and see how long you last!
In my next life I'm coming back as a Kea!
They are freakishly smart birds. Here's a photo a friend of mine took of one recently which made me laugh:
http://www.else.net.nz/tmp/keasandwich.jpg
You don't *need* to feed the kea, they'll feed themselves just fine and if they can't get your sandwich they'll just eat your car.
Nah, mate. If my memory serves me correctly that's the Kakapo, one of the few remaining species of night parrot we have left. It looks like the Kea, but can't fly.
Rusty, there was not a chapter on keas. It was a chapter on Kakapos, the night parrot (although he did mention the kea's predeliction for windshield wipers). You can see the night parrot in the link to the BBC version of Last Chance to See that Darwindr and anonymous posted. Thanks for posting those, as I had no idea that show existed and I love the book and Stephen Fry!
Is mace or pepper spray legal in NZ? Or would a lemon juice water gun be enough to run the little buggers off?
Speaking of capsaicin, a GM sheep with capsaicin genes would be safe from (non-human) predation and perfect for many dishes.
"Speaking of capsaicin, a GM sheep with capsaicin genes would be safe from (non-human) predation and perfect for many dishes."
Sounds like these birds would just go find some sour cream to dip them in!
Capsacin doesn't work on birds... artificial grape flavoring does the trick. But if people can learn to like hot peppers, something tells me the keas would start to like the fake grape taste. No wonder that they can be so destructive. With their beak and claws they're like a flying automomous Swiss army kinfe.
Unfortunately Kea, like so many other birds in NZ, are declining rapidly. The cute playful Kea one sees at the National Parks represent perhaps 1000-5000 Keas left in the wild. That's fewer Kea than Kiwi, though luckily more than the Kakapo. New Zealand is home to some of the rarest birds on Earth, and they just keep gettin' rarer.
I've seen it spelt "Pokeko", "Pukeko" and "Pōkeko". I don't know which is official - the spelling I used with the macron corresponds most closely to how I hear people around here (Rotorua) say it. I claim no expertise - I'm a British import to New Zealand, not a real Kiwi.
Macrons are easy on a Mac - just enable the Maori keyboard map in the "Language and Text" Preference Pane and it's option-o for ō, option-a for ā and you'll be able to spell Māori properly in no time. Don't ask me how on a PC.