While researching Cape Parrots I often come across great comments and tidbits of information which I would like to share. I have created this page as a repository of quotes about Cape Parrots. Some of the quotes are from my email correspondence while others have been gleaned from Internet mailing lists, forums and articles. Currently the topics are unsorted but I will attempt some organization in the future as categories develop. This is an ongoing article so please check back as I will continue to add to it.
Nanny Roo says of all the birds she has, and has fed, her Cape is by far her favorite. Nanny originally named him Zaire, and one day while telling him....."Zaire is pretty", he responded with "Albert is pretty". He could have only heard that on the TV, since we have all tried to think of an Albert, that we know. For days afterwards, anytime she referred to him as Zaire in talking with him, he would repeat the sentence and substitute Albert. He definitely wanted his name changed. So he is now known as Albert........LOL He is also a P.r.s. and weighs just at 400 grams.
Looking at them in a flight, one would think he is about the size of an average grey, but holding them and playing, you soon realize they are more Timneh sized. One hen Cape I have is right at 200 grams (P.r.f.), and one male (P.r.s.) I know his weight to be about 408.
There is no way to compare them to a grey. They are nothing like a grey, or any other bird, for that matter.
We need to educate the people that catch them and sell them for a few rands. We need to expose and prosecute the bastards that are encouraging this trapping by the local people.We need to totally discourage the hybridization of Capes with Grey Headed, which is being knowingly and deliberately done in S.A.. We need to initiate and fund research into PBFDV which could well be their most serious threat towards extinction. We need to save their Yellowwood forests and preserve safe areas for them to live. We need to mobilize all owners to cooperate with captive breeding and join the National Studbook. We need to create public awareness and pride in the bird much as has been done by Paul Butler and RARE with the Caribbean amazons. We need to get corporate sponsorship and financial backing from every possible and conceivable source.
I tested and tested and tested my entire collection of 100 pairs of parrots. These included Macaws incl Hyacinth, Cockatoos incl 7 pairs of Palms, Queens, Hawkheads, most Poicephalus, amazons, caiques, eclectus, rare pionus, Great-bills etc. NOT A SINGLE POSITIVE IN THE BREEDING BIRDS BESIDES THE CAPES! This was even more dumbfounding because I worried that perhaps the Capes has a similar DNA profile to that of the PBFDV assay. The Lab assured me this was not the case and we were left at that. One African Grey and One Grey Headed that were being reared with the Capes were also POS as well as two Greater Jardine's that were parent raised next to an aviary of Capes where the hen and her 5 fully fledged chicks ( but not the cock ) were positive. All I can conclude is that the strain of PBFDV that affects the Capes is equally dangerous to all the African Parrots but not so to the S-American or Australian species.Many of these were in close contact with the Capes and not a single positive.
So I was left with no single pair negative and only 10 odd birds. I paired these up again in early 1999 and put their boxes in only after a 3-4 test in June. One pair bred twice giving a total of 6 chicks. All neg. This year the same pair gave 4 chicks but lost one and I am hand raising the 3.A second pair went down and is raising 4 3 week old chicks beautifully. The other birds are all old enough to breed and could still do so. So if all goes well I should have at least 23 by the end of this year. Still a long was to go!
When young, Shahmari went to anyone. Now, however, he wants only me. He is deeply affectionate with me & gives lots of kisses, but lunges & bites at others. He whistles and talks some. He does a perfect imitation of the phone, and my Grey, Noel, answers with "Hello," "Alright," "Bye, Bye."
Shahmari is a very picky eater. I have him on Harrison's, with veggies, fruit, pasta, nuts, brown rice, & beans. He does not seem to eat much, but weighs in at 385 grams.
I am very much in love with this guy. He has brought me much joy.
I have always figured in nature there would not be a hunger noise coming from a nest cavity. Predators would surely take notice. The food the parents would feed would satisfy them. There would be not "frantic" begging noises.
Theory is, high protein will make chicks frantic/restless, what ever one may want to call it. I learned this with the Jardine's since I have been raising them for many years.
The first thing I did with them is raise the fat level to satisfy the hunger cries (which BTW are not really bad). In the Capes, restlessness seemed more obvious, so I lowered the protein a bit. Wallah! The babies were satisfied and quiet.
(as a side note....this is opposite for Brown heads (Poicephalus cryptoxanthus) that have fatty liver problems. The fat and protein both need to be lowered.)
Correct weaning weights (feel) of birds was well known 15 years ago when importers and breeders were working together. Now we have hobby breeders working with behaviorists who do not have the resources we once had. The "knowledge" from the old timers is being lost. Are we re-inventing the wheel?
When I bought Isabel Taylor's collection of Capes, she had taken one domestic male and moved him out the night before. This was his home and he was in the same room, just in a different cage. She weighed him, the next day before we left, we weighed all the Capes. This particular male had lost 20 grams. So a dramatic weight loss is not unusual for a healthy bird. I have seen this happen many times as well as had Isabel, so we were not worried.
This form of vocalisation made by any bird species in the nest would nonetheless serve as an effective defensive mechanism for a cavity nesting species. A mammal like growling sound emanating from a dark cavity would surely raise suspicions to the actual occupant of the hole to any intruder/predator.
He is a fussy eater and loves almonds, pecans and other similar nuts, peanuts, sunflowers, etc. He hates safflowers and ignores them. His daily diet includes all fruits when in season. He prefers apple cores with the pips rather than the fruit itself. He enjoys peach, apricot and other stones, which he cracks and removes the inside. We don't give him too many of these for obvious reasons. He also love cherries, although his most favourite is pomegranate. If he doesn't get any, he chucks everything else on the floor of his cage in objection, so even when the price is over the top, we still buy them for him.
Like Thor, he wouldn't leave us last night. He had to taste every square inch of our exposed flesh, which gave us some nervous moments, then settled down on my shoulder and rested his beak against my cheek for the rest of the evening.
What a great bird! He's eating everything, and destroying the inadequate toys we bought for him. He doesn't like his cage much, either, and whines about it (I assume that little insistent chirp he makes when alone is a whine) every time we put back into his cage. We have a portable playpen which he likes much more. He hasn't adapted to the idea that he can't fly anymore, and keeps trying to make it from the playpen to one of us. He's got about a three-foot flight range.
I tried to turn him over his back, but he didn't like that and let me know about it. Maybe when he's had a day or two to get used to us.
They're unique-looking birds, aren't they? Their heads are so large in relation to their bodies. From behind, when he turns his head, he has the profile almost of a bald eagle. That beak is a little daunting at first; my son, who's slightly autistic, is still too wary to hold him. But it will all work out in time.
We went through a little spell where he was so bonded to me, he wouldn't go to anyone else, and got very nippy with my wife and kids. We followed some advice in a bird magazine and he's now pretty equal opportunity friendly, with my wife and I, at least.
I give him regular showers, by holding him under the torrent from outside the shower. I'm not ready to take him in with me. If he fell, I'm afraid of what he might grab with that beak. Anyway, he seems to like getting drenched. I bought one of those feather tethers, and he told me where I could stick it. I couldn't get it near him.
Dudley is starting to make some new noises which sound like mumbling, so I'm hoping those are words he's trying to get out. I didn't really get him for that reason, but after reading that other lady on your registry, claiming that her Cape is a better talker than her grey, I've raised my expectations.
All in all, I'm thrilled with this guy. A friend of mine bought a baby grey at the exact same time as I got Dudley and he's going through far more difficulties.
P.r.f. and P.r.s, have ranges totally separate so they do not cross in the wild.
At this point in time we may only have P.r.s. here in the states and we are working with the same bird, but variations from opposite ends of the habitat. Logically this could produce enough variation to make us THINK we have two different subspecies.
A few of us have done a lot of research into the subspecies differences to allow us think we have the two different ones over here. This is the best we can do. I have personally tracked every rumor of us having P.r.r here and upon seeing them, found them to be inaccurately classed.
I have had three different people from S. Africa go thru my flock of capes and *TRY* to sort them out. Most all of mine are wild caught birds from Africa, so we know they are pure. Not person could be 100% sure. One was a noted aviculturist, another an aviculturist. and the other was Mike Perrin head of conservation and research at the University of Natal in S. Africa. The African Parrot Society brought him here a few years ago to speak at the AFA convention. His lecture was on Cape parrots as well as some of the more rare Poicephalus.
After he had gone through my flock, he said to me...."I thought I had them all figured out, until I saw yours". He stated he had never seen so many capes in one place at one time. That is part of the problem. You cannot "see" the differences from one place to the other well enough to say what the differences are. Weights, measurements, bone structure is the only way (except for DNA, maybe) to know, and that has to be compared with the same stats from birds of known origin.
So, we pair like with like as best we can. Can't ask for any more than that. If I have a small P.r.s. male, he very well could be paired with a large P.r.f. hen. Nothing I, or any one else can do. We try.
At this point in time all the cape parrots are the species robustus, the subspecies is what makes the difference. So if someone says they have Poicephalus robustus, what they are saying is they have cape parrots, period. When the little r, s, or f is added, then we are talking the subspecies.
Craig Symes - Cape Researcher S.A.
The taxonomic revision of the Cape Parrot Poicephalus robustus
The taxonomic status of the Cape Parrot Poicephalus robustus Gmelin 1788, has recently been researched and revised (Wirminghaus & Perrin 1994; Clancey 1997; Symes, Wirminghaus, Downs, Perrin 1998; Wirminghaus, Downs, Symes & Perrin In prep.). Significant morphometric, plumage colour, habitat requirements and range separations support the validity of two separate species. Three subspecies have previously been recognized: i) Poicephalus robustus robustus Gmelin, 1788, type locality - specimen lost, possibly Eastern Cape (Clancey 1965); ii)Poicephalus robustus suahelicus Reichenow, 1898, type locality: Msua, near Bagamoyo, eastern Tanzania, East Africa (Chapin 1939; Clancey 1965); iii) Poicephalus robustus fuscicollis Kuhl, 1820, Type locality: uncertain, probably Gambia (Chapin 1939). Clancey (19970 first proposed the recognition of two separate species P.robustus and P.fuscicollis (P.f.fuscicollis and P.f.suahelicus) and this has been supported (Wirminghaus & Perrin 1994; Symes et al. 1998; Wirminghaus et al. In prep).
The Cape Parrot P.robustus is confined to the austral range of the taxon in naturally fragmented Mistbelt Mixed Podocarpus forests of south-eastern South Africa (Maclean 1993; Forshaw 1989; Clancey 1997; Wirminghaus 1997). This is a forest-specific species, dependant on predominantly the Outeniqua yellowwood Podocarpus falcatus as a source of food and as nest sites (Wirminghaus 1997; Wirminghaus et al. In prep.). Historically this species had a wider distribution and habitat destruction, capture for the avicultural bird trade, shooting of birds as pests and possibly disease has reduced the population to fewer than an estimated 1 000 birds (Boshoff 1980; Downs & Symes 1998). The present distribution ranges from Alice in the Eastern Cape Province, through the forests of the former Transkei, to the Karkloof of KwaZulu-Natal Province. Historically specimens were collected outside the present range near Zuurbron in the southern Mpumalanga Province in 1905 (BMNH), Newcastle in KwaZulu-Natal Province in 1890 (BMNH) and Haenertsberg (near Pietersberg) in the southern Northern Province (TM). A relict population is found 400 km to the north in the escarpment forests of the Northern Province (Kemp 1974; Wirminghaus 1997).
Two sub-species of the Greyheaded (or Brown-necked) Parrot are found. Poicephalus fuscicollis suahelicus, is found from the Northern Province of South Africa just south of the Limpopo River, north through Zimbabwe, western Mozambique, the Caprivi of Namibia, eastern Angola, Zambia, to northern Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda and southern Zaire (Fry, Keith & Urban 1988; Forshaw 1989; Symes et al. 1998; Parker 1999; Wirminghaus et al. In prep). In East Africa it is an uncommon resident of woodlands being patchily distributed in Tanzania (Britton 1980; Forshaw 1989), and in the highlands of eastern Zaire it occurs in montane forest to 3750 m.a.s.l. (Chapin 1939; Lippens 1976Britton 1980; Forshaw 1989). In Zambia, where it is widely distributed (48% of atlas squares) (Aspinwall pers.comm.), yet nowhere common (Leonard pers.comm; Snow et al. 1978). In Malawi and Zambia it is generally uncommon in woodlands to about 2000 m.a.s.l. where woodland tree species provide seeds for food and hole cavities for nesting (Fry et al. 1988). Zambia is reported as one of its strongholds and seasonal movements are recorded (Aspinwall pers.comm.; Leonard pers.comm.). These birds are noted as being more nomadic than other Poicephalus species (Forshaw 1989). In Zimbabwe it is widespread, yet uncommon, in woodlands along major river courses and scarce above 1000 m.a.s.l. (Smithers, Irwin & Paterson 1957; Irwin 1981).
P.f.fuscicollis is confined to drier parts of west Africa, from Senegal to northern Nigeria, but rare and local in the east of its range (Bannerman 1953, Elgood 1982; Forshaw 1989). It is a seasonal visitor to the northern regions of Ghana (Moyer pers.comm.), and the Plateau Province of Cote d*Ivoire in April and May (Bannerman 1953), where it is uncommon. In the mangroves of the Gambia it is more common (Bannerman 1953).
The division of these separate species has been proposed in recent literature and the two species are easily separated on a visual basis (Forshaw 1989; Maclean 1993; Clancey 1997; Wirminghaus 1997; Symes et al. 1998). Duetting vocalizations are also possibly species specific (pers.obs.). Preliminary DNA analyses support these findings (Bloomer pers.comm.).
Dr. Colleen T. Downs - Cape Researcher S.A.
For your interest the Cape Parrot papers that are being published are:
Cape Parrots are still relatively unknown, and now their names are going to change. So, I don't think there is a solution that is not going to cause some confusion. The solution I plan to use is the best one I can come up with to introduce the new names and still have people that visit our site realize that we breed what they have assumed were Cape Parrots. In a few years, if new books and magazine articles consistently refer to them as brown-necked and grey-headed parrots, I may drop the "Cape" part of the names, but that isn't going to happen in the near future.
And, please note, that even though I pointed out in a previous email that "official" common names do not exist, accepted common names do. For example, the common names given in "Parrots of the World" and "The Lexicon of Parrots" are accepted common names. So, I will use those names that will probably become accepted as a function of publication, which are brown-necked parrot and grey-headed parrot. I'm adding the "Cape" for continuity. If a bunch of people on this list got together, formed a club, and decided that they were going to call their pet Prs Capes silver-headed parrots, I would not consider using that common name because it is unlikely to appear in the literature and become an accepted alternative to grey-headed parrot.
Well, I brought him home and he ahs been the love of my life! He has never bittten me and it has now been a year. Yes, I would still like to breed Capes, but i am not sure I would be willing to give up this wonderful friend. I know that some day I will find him alittle mate and let him have a family, then I can love on his babies too. But he is certainly my "dream bird"