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Watch
a Very Funny African Gray
Parrots
live long lives? You bet!
LONDON
AP (Jan. 20, 2004) - British
war leader Winston Churchill's foul-mouthed 104-year old parrot refused
to surrender to newshounds Monday after a British newspaper tracked
the bird down and discovered it was still alive.
"They've been trying to get
him to talk all day, but he's not saying much," said Sylvia Martin,
who manages Heathfield Nurseries where parrot Charlie has lived for
the last 12 years.
Charlie, who kept Churchill company
during World War II, was famous for occasionally squawking four-letter
obscenities about Hitler. But Martin told Reuters the bird has mellowed.
"He doesn't say very much anymore
-- usually just hello and goodbye. But he does get so excited about
music and dances to it. He's very fit."
Charlie -- invariably referred to
as "he" despite being female -- is now owned by Peter Oram,
the garden center's owner, Martin said. Oram's father-in-law sold Churchill
the bird and was asked to take it back after the prime minister died
in 1965.
Steve Nichols, founder of Britain's
National Parrot Sanctuary, said that although parrots did not often
live longer than 40 in the wild, some had lived to up to 110.
"It's obviously had the best
life possible," he said. |
Meet
our dancing African Gray, Mickey.
Click
Here Before Ever Kissing a Parrot on its Beak or Putting One Your
Shoulder!
"My
Great Uncle Bob, Robert
Jennings, who was the face of the boy in shoe for Buster Brown
Shoes, circa 1905, grew up to serve as the videographer assigned to
icon newscaster Gabriel Heatter in the early days of black & white
television.
He was also one of the
photographers who captured the Hindenburg on film as it went down
near Lindhurst, New Jersey. When I met him as a teenager, he was already
retired selling television consoles to the daytime TV stars who lived
in Connecticut and worked in New York City. While they shopped in
his home showroom, he would play the Hammond Organ for them. He learned
the instrument early on, growing into a young man who would provide
the music for the silent movies in nearby small towns like Brewster,
New York.
I enjoyed my rare visits
with him while seeing his green Amazon parrot that sang, "Old
King Cole" as she turned around and around in her cage. That
inspired me in later life to find Mickey, a parrot taken in by the
late and wonderful
Nancy
Weaver, a kind and dear woman who ran a
parrot sanctuary in central New Jersey on a dollar and a prayer. The
last time I saw her she was terminally ill with cancer, telling me
she hoped the good Lord needed someone to help tend his flock of birds.
We all miss Nancy, who gave so many unwanted birds new homes so their
beauty and intelligence could be appreciated again.
Mickey displays this independence
when I wave my finger at her in frustration saying, 'Naughty girl,'
as she shreds newspaper into pieces that float over and onto my desk
area. Her feathers then get real tight around her body as she swings
her beak at me and says, 'What?' "
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